


Ereri Week Spring 2016

by Lady_Bluebird



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Attack on Space, Alternate Universe - Dragons, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Badass Armin Arlert, Badass Mikasa Ackerman, Baking, Bottom Eren Yeager, Clones, College Student Eren Yeager, Delivery Person Eren Yeager, Doctor Hange Zoë, Dominant Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Dragon Eren Yeager, Dragon Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Eren Is a Little Shit, Eren is the Sun, Ereri Week Spring 2016, Famous Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), French Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Human Experimentation, Intern Levi, Isabel and Farlan and Levi are Siblings, Jean Kirstein is a good bro, Jean is a Shipper, Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin) Being An Asshole, Light Angst, Literal Sleeping Together, M/M, Mamma Zoë, Marco is a Sweetheart, Platonic Hange Zoë & Levi, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Police Officer Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Possible/Lightly Implied Depression, Stripper Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Teacher Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Vampire Eren Yeager, Vampire Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Wedding Fluff, and Levi is the Moon, showering together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-09
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-07 07:15:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6792859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Bluebird/pseuds/Lady_Bluebird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A compilation of works from Ereri Week Spring 2016.<br/>May 8: Confession<br/>May 9: Cherry Blossoms/Flowers<br/>May 10: Firsts<br/>May 11: Animals/Pets<br/>May 12: Rainy Days<br/>May 13: Love Song<br/>May 14:  Day & Night<br/>BONUS DAY (May 15): Smile</p><p>Eren, a newly graduated college student, catches his crush in an unlikely place. Levi desperately needs some color in his life. One of Erwin's clones catches his son's eye. A young dragon finds shelter with a previously unknown neighbor. Vampires have to be reminded that they aren't monsters. Levi returns from a trip to find Eren waiting for him. The sun and the moon fall in love, despite the fact that they're ill-suited for one another. And, at the end of the week, Eren and Levi face a daunting obstacle before their wedding.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Confessions

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, sorry for the late post. I was out today and couldn't have this up earlier. Also, since I was rushing a little, I apologize for any typos. I edited this pretty quickly. Anyways, I had a lot of fun with this, hope you like it!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Modern AU - College student!Eren who is totally crushing on his superhawt biology teacher. The school year is over, and to celebrate the end of finals and their upcoming graduation, the gang goes out to have some fun and... stuff happens ;)

“Do you think you did well?”

Eren and Armin stood outside of the Sina University Health Department, waiting in the burning May sun for Jean and Marco to arrive for their rendezvous. The campus felt hushed. Only a few students were idling around the building, and nobody was strolling down the path to the student union, which was shining in pale lime light from the sun-bright trees along the cobblestone. Like Armin and Eren, the students were done with their finals and busy packing up to go home. 

“I think so,” Eren fiddled with the strap on his backpack, checking his watch (a graduation gift from his parents) every now and then. “I mean, I studied for that test almost as much as you did, Armin, so I think I’ll be okay.”

Armin laughed a little. “I still can’t believe your dad insisted on joining our study group.”

Eren groaned at the memory. “That’s what I get for having parents that live near campus." Eren’s parents had insisted that their little boy should live with them during his time at the university. Most of the time, Eren didn’t mind. A doctor father was a good resource, and Carla Jaeger always welcomed her son home with a cookie and clean laundry. However, a week or so before finals had started, Eren, Armin, and Reiner had settled down for a few hours to go over their old biology notes and tests. The moment the boys had walked through the front door, Grisha had announced that he would help them study. He sat down at the table with the students to drill them on their course, nonstop, for the next two and half hours.

“It’s great that your parents care so much about your education, though,” Armin reasoned diplomatically. “And your father was a big help.”

Eren nodded and sighed, glancing around the small square. “Where’s Reiner? I thought he was right behind us.”

Armin smirked. “He stayed behind to talk to Professor Ackerman.”

“Oh? About what?”

“I don’t know, probably grades or something like that,” Armin grinned and wiggled an eyebrow suggestively. “You jealous?”

“What?” Eren sputtered indignantly. “No! Armin!”

“Please. I’ve seen your search history, Eren. You stalk Professor Ackerman online, don't you? Don't try to deny it.”

_“Armin!”_

“You’re totally crushing on him,” Armin carried on, completely unmoved by Eren’s mortification and beet-red cheeks. “Not that I blame you or anything. He’s pretty hot. For an old guy.”

Eren bristled. “He’s thirty-one. Thirty-one isn’t old.”

Armin just hummed in satisfaction. “See? You know how old he is. That’s being a little obsessed, right? And you didn’t even deny it.”

Eren wanted to melt. 

“Hey!” Marco appeared around the corner of the Health Building, panting. Jean was close on his heels, sandy brown hair plastered to his forehead with sweat. “Sorry we’re late! The bus broke down a couple miles from here.” The freckled brunette frowned when he caught Armin’s smirk and Eren’s humiliated expression. “Is something wrong?”

“Nope,” Armin said cheerfully. “Eren’s just in denial.”

“Armin,” Eren groaned. “Don’t.”

“Oh?” Marco asked curiously. “About what?”

“Eren has a crush on Professor Ackerman.”

Jean snorted. “That would never happen.”

“Yes Jean, thank you,” Eren said dryly. “I’m aware.”

“The school year’s over anyways, and you probably won’t see him after you graduate,” Jean shrugged. “Unless you’re sticking around after graduation.”

“Can we just drop it?” Eren snapped. He’d already contemplated not ever seeing the professor again, and Eren would be lying if he said that saying goodbye to the teacher didn’t both him. Professor Ackerman was a brilliant teacher, and while he was foul-mouthed and unapproachable, he was never harsh or unkind. His expectations, despite what other students said, weren’t unreasonable. He expected dedication and effort, and his rigorous teaching and high expectations had done Eren a lot of good. The professor helped him work hard enough to be second in the class. His dry humor made Eren laugh, too. He was always understanding of any difficulties his students had and found ways to make sure all of his pupils could be comfortable in class. 

“Touchy,” Jean teased one last time, holding up his hands in surrender. “Chill, Jaeger. I’ll drop it.” Turning back to Armin, he added, “I think we need to celebrate tonight. Finals are over, and we’re graduating. That’s reason enough to unwind, right?”

Armin yawned and stretched, popping his neck. “Actually, yeah. That sounds like great idea.”

Jean grinned. “Awesome. Bert told me about this great place where he and Reiner went over spring break - y'know, while they went traveling upstate? It’s kinda far away, but apparently the drive is worth it.”

Eren eyed Jean warily. “What kind of ‘great place’ is it?”

“Just a bar,” Jean waved a hand dismissively. “Nothing too fancy or weird, don’t worry.”

“Well, it sounds good to me,” Marco interjected. “What time do you want to meet up there?”

“How about nine thirty?” Armin suggested. “Grandpa will want me to stay with him for a bit this evening, just for a little dinner, but after that I should be free.”

“Sounds good to me,” Jean agreed. Marco nodded, too.

“Eren?” Armin asked. “Does nine thirty work for you tonight?”

“Sure,” Eren was still smarting from Armin’s jabs, but he wasn’t going to pass up a chance to have fun. 

“Alright then, it’s a plan.” Jean said. “I’ll send you guys the directions later.”  
_________________________________

“This is not a bar,”

Armin’s voice was thick with horror. 

“This is not a bar. Jean said it was a bar, Eren. It’s not, though. This can’t possibly be a bar.”

“Well,” Marco said, ever the optimist, “they do have a bar.” He pointed over to one corner, where there was indeed a sleek granite bar, already packed with boisterous patrons. 

“Maybe he got the directions wrong,” Armin muttered to himself. “Maybe this is all a mistake.”

Eren shook his head. “I doubt it. There isn’t another bar within ten miles of this place.”

Jean had directed them to a strip club.

Strobe lights in various neons pulsed in time to the pounding beat. A mix of men and women clogged the floor, all of them young and most of them tipsy and giggling, stumbling over each other and becoming increasingly animated. Apparently, some of Sina’s other students had had the same idea as Jean. 

Honestly, Eren didn’t know what to make of the situation. If this was one of Jean’s weird jokes, so be it. It could have been worse. Eren had never been to a strip club, but he wasn’t a blushing virgin by any means. He could handle it. Besides, when he looked around at the dancers, he only saw women. Eren wasn’t really into women.

Jean arrived presently, closely followed by Reiner and Bert, and the guys went to get their first drinks of the night. 

Eren wasn’t a fan of alcohol, but he took a shot to appease Jean and winced at the way the bitter, heavy liquid scorched his throat. 

Turning to Jean, Eren asked, “Why did you bring us here, anyways?”

Jean’s answering grin could have scared the Devil. “You’ll see. By the end of tonight, you’ll be thanking me for bringing us here.”

Eren shook his head. “Yeah right. What’re you going to do, pick up a guy for me at a strip club?”

Jean just laughed. “Even better. Just wait.”

And wait they did. By the tenth or eleventh dancer, Eren was bored out of his skull. Reiner, Bertl, and Jean were completely, jubilantly, wasted. Poor, scandalized Armin was sitting on his bar stool with his face partially hidden behind his hands, watching with mortified incredulity. Marco seemed completely unfazed by the blatantly sexual dancers and just sat sipping his drink with a small smile. 

Suddenly, the music changed. The wildly pulsing beat slowing into a more seductive, low rhythm. The neons lights shifted into a deep, rich crimson. 

Jean gripped Eren’s shoulder. “Watch,” He whispered excitedly into Eren’s ear. “This is what I wanted you to see.”

A figure appeared on top of the stage. A shirtless, lithely muscled man stood perfectly still with his arms crossed over his chest, legs spread apart in a wide, challenging stance that screamed authority and demanded attention. 

The crowd was screaming now, grasping towards the stage with eager hands, eyes shining in the strobe lights. The man in the lights didn’t respond, scanning the crowd with impassive gunmetal eyes.

The DJ’s voice boomed over the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, are _you_ in for a treat tonight!”

The crowd roared in agreement.

“Tonight, we have the very best of the best coming in for a special performance,” The DJ paused dramatically. “Please welcome the Corporal!”

The crowd went nuts, and as the man strode forwards, jeans hanging low on his prominent hipbones, Eren almost choked on air.

Next to him, Armin let out a strangled sound. “Oh my god, Eren.”

“Sweet buttery Jesus,” Reiner muttered in amazement.

“See?” Jean said smugly. “What did I tell ya?”

As the man strode confidently up to center stage, it became impossible to mistake him for anyone other than Professor Ackerman. The raven-haired man had shed his glasses, but that wasn't enough to disguise him - that undercut and those steely eyes were unmistakably the biology teacher's. As Eren’s eyes roamed over the man’s perfectly chiseled torso, Eren saw the sharp curves of a tattoo, a pair of overlapping black and white wings that curled around the man’s side. 

The music slid into a remix of Christina Aguilera’s “Dirrty”. 

Professor Ackerman strode over to the pole, the muscles in his shoulders and back caught by the lights of the club. He curled himself around the pole easily, stretching up like a cat and wrapping one leg around the pole in a single, fluid movement.

Jean laughed in Eren’s ear. “You can’t take your eyes off him, can you?”

It was true; Eren was hypnotized by the grey-eyed man. His mind was buzzing, fumbling over the apparent fact that his biology professor was a stripper, of all things - but he quickly pushed the thought out of his head in favor of the delicious sight before him. 

_Oh, I'm overdue_  
_Give me some room_  
_I'm comin through_  
_Paid my dues_  
_In the mood_  
_Me and the girls gonna shake the room_

The professor slid up and around the pole in a simple spin, a warm up, boots skimming lightly over the ground. The crowd was already eating it up, shouting and catcalling. 

_DJ's spinning (show your hands)_  
_Let's get dirrty (that's my jam)_  
_I need that, uh, to get me off_  
_Sweatin' until my clothes come off_

Then the dancing really began. Eren sat back, drinking in the sight, as his friends openly gaped at their teacher. It was almost comical, how shocked they were. 

_It's explosive, speakers are pumping (oh)_  
_Still jumping, six in the morning_  
_Table dancing, glasses are crashing (oh)_  
_No question, time for some action_

Every movement was fueled by fire, fierce and commanding. The Corporal swirled in a series of kicks and twists, showing off sculpted muscle at every opportunity and glaring at the crowd with lazy, hooded steel eyes. His face was unreadable, toned arms raised over his head, hips swinging, practically making love to the pole.

_Temperature's up (can you feel it)_  
_About to erupt_  
_Gonna get my girls_  
_Get your boys_  
_Gonna make some noise_

_Wanna get rowdy_  
_Gonna get a little unruly_  
_Get it fired up in a hurry_  
_Wanna get dirrty_  
_It's about time that I came to start the party_  
_Sweat dripping over my body_  
_Dancing getting just a little naughty_  
_Wanna get dirrty_  
_It's about time for my arrival_

Jean pushed Eren off his stool and grabbed his hand, dragging him through the crowd and towards the stage.

“What the hell?” Eren demanded, struggling feebly. “Jean, what the fuck are you doing?”

“What does it look like?” Jean had to shout into Eren’s ear over the roar of the crowd and speakers in order to be heard. “I’m getting you where he can see you!”

“Wait – what?!”

_Ah, heat is up_  
_So ladies, fellas_  
_Drop your cups_  
_Body's packed_  
_Front to back_  
_Now move your ass_  
_I like that_

_Tight hip huggers (low for sure)_  
_Shake a little somethin' (on the floor)_  
_I need that, uh, to get me off_  
_Sweatin' until my clothes come off_

_Let's get open, cause a commotion (ooh oh)_  
_We're still going, eight in the morning_  
_There's no stopping, we keep it popping (oh)_  
_Hot rocking, everyone's talking_

Eren had to admit, the view at the front of the crowd was fantastic. He could see the slight rise and fall of the Corporal’s chest as he danced and the slick sheen of sweat over his inked skin. 

_Give all you got (give it to me)_  
_Just hit the spot_  
_Gonna get my girls_  
_Get your boys_  
_Gonna make some noise_

_Rowdy_  
_Gonna get a little unruly_  
_Get it fired up in a hurry_  
_Wanna get dirrty_  
_It's about time that I came to start the party_  
_Ooh sweat dripping over my body_  
_Dancing getting just a little naughty_  
_Wanna get dirrty (oh, oh)_  
_It's about time for my arrival_

Eren’s hear stopped the moment that the Corporal locked eyes with him. The raven-haired man didn’t miss a beat, but his eyes widened in recognition. Eren swallowed hard under the man’s scrutiny, unable to break eye contact, like a deer in headlights. 

After a moment, the Corporal’s impassive expression was replaced with a lazy smirk. 

_Here it comes, it's the one_  
_You've been waiting on_  
_Get up, get it up_  
_Yup, that's what's up_  
_Giving just what you love_  
_To the maximum_  
_Uh oh, here we go (here we go)_

The Corporal slid off the pole and across the stage, moving towards Eren with long, leisurely strides. One hand slid down his chest to run along the waistband of his pants, curling the fabric down suggestively across his hips. The raven-haired man kept Eren enthralled with his steely gaze the entire time. 

Eren could only stand there in the crowd, rooted to the spot. His heart was pounding in his throat, and he realized that he was panting ever so slightly. The crowd parted around the Corporal like a sea, all eyes fixed on the pair. Somewhere in the dance, Jean had deserted Eren, and the smug jerk was watching the show gleefully from his seat at the bar with the other students. 

The Corporal flung both arms around Eren’s shoulders. The brunet's squawk of shock died in his throat as the man pressed their bodies together, rolling his chest up against Eren’s and purring the lyrics into Eren’s ear. 

_Gonna get a little unruly_  
_Get it fired up in a hurry_  
_Wanna get dirrty_  
_It's about time that I came to start the party_  
_Ooh sweat dripping over my body_  
_Dancing getting just a little naughty_  
_Wanna get dirrty (oh, oh)_  
_It's about time for my arrival_

Eren was an absolute wreck. His unruly brown hair was plastered to his face, breathing ragged. His pupils were blown incredibly wide, ringed by a barely-there circle of teal green. His head was swimming, and he struggled to keep his arms low at his side. He was frightened by what might happen if he reached out and touched the Corporal, even though he badly wanted that skin under his hands. 

The last notes of the song died away all too soon. Despite himself, Eren let out a little whine as the Corporal slid away, earning a chuckle from the man before he slipped off into the crowd. 

Eren stood there numbly for a minute, thoughts indistinct, before he let out a shuddering breath and darted off after the Corporal and down the hall backstage.

Professor Ackerman’s door was the last one in the hall, and when Eren threw the door open, the older man was waiting, unsurprised.

“Close it,” 

Eren did, and the moment the door was shut, he said, “What are you doing here?”

Professor Ackerman snorted and leaned back against the wall in a pose that seemed purposefully sexual. He hadn’t changed out of his outfit from the dance yet, Eren noticed. “Teaching doesn’t pay all that well at the university, and I have a kid sister to take care of. Don’t get me wrong, I love teaching, but it’s not a good way to pay the bills. Stripping for hormonal brats isn’t an ideal job either, but it’s money in my pocket at the end of the night.”

Eren would have been lying if he said that the idea of the Corporal being a teacher by day and stripper by night wasn't turning him on. “Why did you do that?”

“Do what?” The teacher raised an eyebrow in teasing, mocked innocence. “Dance?”

“You know what,” Eren swallowed. “Dancing like that.”

“Like what?” The teacher peeled himself off the wall and strode over to Eren in a few quick steps, lacing their fingers together and pushing the boy against the wall. “Like this?” The Corporal breathed in Eren’s ear.

“Y-yes,” Eren squeaked, leaning into the teacher’s touch despite himself.

Professor Ackerman chuckled. “You’re not very subtle, Eren. I noticed you, all those times you would stare at me in class. The way you would come up to talk to me after lectures for whatever dumb, mundane reason seemed to come to mind. The expression on your face every time I brushed against you when you scooted too close or tapped you on the shoulder. I’m not stupid. And the way you looked tonight…” The professor purred. “I know you want me, Eren.”

“But-but that doesn’t explain why y-you danced like that,” Eren stuttered. Somewhere in his speech, Professor Ackerman had begun to roll his hips against Eren’s, ever so gently, and now he was watching the college graduate writhe slightly under the action.

“Shitty brat. Do I really have to spell it out for you?” Professor Ackerman sighed. “You’re cute and you’re not an asshole. If you want me, you can have me.” He leaned in even closer, nipping at Eren’s throat and humming in amusement when Eren bit back a soft moan. “All you have to do is say it. Do you want me, Eren?”

The night felt dreamlike, unreal and almost fantastical to Eren. Right now, though, he couldn’t get enough of the Corporal – his vaguely minty scent, his hard muscle, that perfectly sinful smile. Eren would be damned if he was going to let go of this man. “Yes sir,” He breathed, his voice high and needy. “I want you, sir. I want you so, so much.”

Professor Ackerman chuckled, slipping one hand down to play with the fly on Eren’s jeans. “Good boy. First thing first, though, if you’re going to scream my name, I want it to be my real one.” He fiddled with Eren’s belt, too, unbuckling it and pushing it away in one swift movement. 

“Call me Levi,”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whelp there you go. I honestly didn't have the time to put in smut right now, so this is more of a taste - later on, y'all get some hot sex. 
> 
> Or maybe I'll post the smut separately later, or add it when I have time. I'll have to see.
> 
> Anyways, now I have to go back to memorizing "Le Corbeau et Le Renard" *kneels over*
> 
> You can find me on [ tumblr ](http://lady-goldfinch.tumblr.com/)


	2. Cherry Blossoms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Today's prompt is "Cherry Blossoms/Flowers", and today's chapter is just some fluffy, poetic(ish) drabble. Police officer Levi leads a hellishly boring life, and then a stupid little brat falls in to give him some color.
> 
> Have fun!

People are a dime a dozen. Levi watched a thousand of them pass him by every day on the street. The old, the young, men and women, loud and quiet, wearing bright colors and dark ones, revealing clothes and conservative outfits. Names and faces were lost in the blur of the crowd and forgotten almost before he saw or heard them. Nobody meant anything. Details melted into a monotone world of foggy sounds and bland scents. Cheap, easy people, living tin-and-paper lives. 

The city was dull and dead, a steel jungle with poisoned air and billboards of models with cruel, unreachable perfection. Newspapers with runny ink cluttered the rusty storm drains, and the cacophony of hawkers and traffic was deafening. 

Even what little life did exist inside the city was monotone. Every park was populated by symmetrical trees and perfectly clipped, perfectly green grass. The birds were splashed with the same dull greys and dirty whites of the city, pigeons with no real color or feel to them. 

Levi endured it. Every day, he stepped out of his little box apartment and waded through the city’s great grey sea of people on his way to work. He spent his work hours faking interest in others’ troubles - a familiar question here, a nod there, play police - and get home as quickly as he could. Levi would pace around his apartment until the early hours of the morning, sleep dreamlessly, wake up, and repeat. Over and over again, week after week, year after year. Formulaic. 

If he didn’t think, he could do it. 

Time didn’t mean anything, so Levi lost track of the days as the months passed on and the seasons changed from fall to winter. 

And one day, while Levi was sitting at his desk in the night while the city droned on below him, his phone rang.

That in itself was unusual. Levi talked to his coworkers as little as possible, and he didn’t keep friends. He let the phone ring once, twice, three times, and then he picked it up, curling his hands around the cool metal and breathing into it. “Hello?”

“Levi!” The voice on the other end was a not-quite-vaguely-familiar baritone, deep and layered with exasperation. "Do you know what day it is?"

Levi hadn’t changed his calendar since July. There it was on the wall, untouched, with a bright watercolor header of sun and beaches. “No. Who is this?”

“Levi, it’s Erwin,”

“Erwin?” A bell rang faintly in a corner of Levi’s mind. He turned off his desk lamp. It wasn’t making the little room any brighter. 

“My wife is your partner. We met once, at the station’s Fourth of July party?” 

“Oh. You’re Erwin Smith.” Levi remembered now, sort of. That had been a sticky, hot day, and the fireworks at night had hurt his ears and plastered the world with faded red and blues. “Hange’s husband.” Hange. His partner. She liked to turn on the sirens and tear down the streets, even when they weren’t on duty. That was all he knew about her, though – he never returned her questions, and Levi had forgotten that she’d been married. “I barely remembered you. I was kind of out of it that day.” A lame excuse, and they both knew it, but whatever. 

“It’s alright,” Erwin seemed to mean it. “Levi, today’s December 24th.” 

“Is it?” Levi peered out the window. Even in the watercolor blacks and yellows of the streetlights and alleys, he could see the soft curves of snow. Huh. Maybe it was..

“The station is having a little party tomorrow for the holidays,” Erwin explained on the other end of the phone. His voice sounded dingy and echoic over the line. “Hange is out now getting some decorations, but she wanted to know if you’d come.” 

“Sure,”

“Six o’clock, sharp,”

“That’ll work,” It wasn't like he had anything planned. “I’ll be there.”

Erwin chuckled. “Great, Levi. We’ll see you there. Take care of yourself, alright?”

“Bye,”

Levi slept that night with a window open, hoping to feel the cold. 

He really didn’t, though. 

The next morning, when he stood out on the rough concrete sidewalk, it occurred to him that maybe he should buy something for the party. That’s what people usually did, right? Bring things like wine or cookies to show their appreciation to the host. He was off today, and he had until six – it was eight in the morning now – so he strode off somewhere to find a gift. 

First he found a little records store on the corner, manned by some scrawny college kid with a bad buzzcut. Music wasn’t a bad idea – parties usually had music - but Levi didn’t know what to get Hange to play. She didn’t seem like the kind of person who wanted to listen to classical music, but Levi couldn’t bear the thought of buying her a CD of holiday songs. The stores started playing holiday anthems the moment Thanksgiving was over, and by the time the holidays actually rolled around, Levi was always sick to death of the stupid tunes. The kid at the counter, Connie, offered him some “totally dope” Elvis hip-hop remixes for the party. Mildly horrified by the concept, Levi declined. 

He saw a bakery, but there would probably be enough cakes and cookies at the party, and the girl behind the counter was too off-putting. When Levi walked in through the buttermilk-cream doorway, she was covered in crumbs, licking chocolate frosting off a spoon with one hand and holding a crumbled ball of powdered, pink-dyed cookie dough in the other. Scarfing down her own wares like a pig. Best to go elsewhere. 

As Levi was walking down the street, annoyed and frustrated, the world suddenly tilted drunkenly around him as something struck him from behind, slamming into his spine and somehow crushing his rib cage from behind. Levi sprawled over the sidewalk, gasping to pull air through his crushed lungs. 

“The fuck?” He hacked, coughing. 

“Sorry! I’m so sorry sir, it’s all my fault!” The face that appeared over Levi was that of a young man, some college kid with shaggy fawn hair that stuck up all over the place and wide, glittering eyes like celadon moons.

“It’s all right.” 

It was better than all right, though, it was so fucking perfect. He was vibrantly aware of the blunt, hard edge of the curb pressing into his hipbone and the burn of the long, shallow scrape on his knee from where he had slid across the pavement. He was battered, sure, but the throbbing cut on his leg and the blistering pain in his chest was absolutely exquisite. The adrenaline of the impact was singing through his veins, a moment of being so, so awake. 

Levi let the kid haul him to his feet, savoring the rich amber brown of the boy’s tanned skin. Looking up at the boy – because of course the kid was taller than he was – he saw what he supposed was the his discarded delivery bike nearby. Its basket of cherry blossoms was overturned, and pastel pink flowers were tossed haphazardly all over the sidewalk. 

The kid was talking, apologizing profusely and watching Levi with those magnificent eyes, and his words snagged on Levi’s ears. He could make sense of them, hear them, with clarity, and he turned to watch the kid instead of dismissing him. 

“Do you need anything?” Flower Boy asked anxiously, hovering there on the pavement like a hummingbird at a standstill. “I didn’t break anything, did I? I was going pretty fast. If you need help, I can take you to the doctor’s. Or, Mikasa makes me bring a first aid kit in case I get hurt, so I could use that.”

Levi snorted. “Kid, I have a boo-boo on my knee and the wind knocked out of me. Calm down.”

“Oh,” The boy looked relieved, and Levi watched in amazement as he got a little brighter, his greens and browns and the navy of his clothes bleeding out into the air around him. His voice was the same, ringing clearly in the buzz of the city and adding depth to the honking horns and shouting around the two of them. 

“Okay, well, um –,” Flower Boy fidgeted nervously under Levi’s scrutiny, glancing around at everything except for the raven-haired man. 

_Poor kid, doesn’t know what to do with himself._

“Oh,” Flower Boy groaned, looking over to see the scattered flowers from his basket. “Oh, shit.” He darted over to the cherry blossoms and tried to salvage the petals, tucking whatever few were intact into his basket, but the wind had picked up, and the soft cherry blossoms were tossed up around the boy like some miniature cyclone. “Double shit, triple shit, oh man is Mikasa going to kill me.” He moaned in despair. “These were special order, and I needed them delivered by ten. No way can I get them there on time.” 

The kid’s worry was infectious, and Levi felt personally violated, somehow, by the young man’s distress. A threat to his colors. “Here, kid,” Levi pulled out his wallet. “It’s my fault for being in the way. I’ll pay.”

Flower Boy stuttered and protested and shook his head, but Levi insisted and threatened and eventually just shoved a few crisp bills into the boy’s hands. 

Levi was suddenly struck with a delicious idea. 

“By the way,” Levi asked, “Do you have some sort of business card? I’d like to place an order.”  
____________________________

Later than evening, Levi went to the party. There was life in the station that night. It overflowed with laughter and purples and reds that actually registered in Levi’s mind, even amid the nerves that thrummed through him. Would he come? Did he make all the deliveries by himself, even on Christmas day? 

Halfway through the party, there was still no appearance. 

The CD Hange had put on – which was, actually, the Elvis remix Levi had been offered earlier - began to fade in and out of rhythm. Levi’s third glass of eggnog was mildly sweet and smoothly textureless on his tongue. 

Of course the kid wouldn’t be here – he was young, he was probably with his family or out with friends. 

But the sound of the doorbell, piercing and musical in the night, cut to his bones like a knife. 

Levi was at the door before Hange was, flinging the door open with shivering fingers. 

The boy stood on the step, bundled up in a soft orange parka. Snow dotted his hair, which was no neater than it had been that morning, and he clutched a large cardboard box in his arms. Everything about him – the brightness of his red ears and nose in the cold, those red mittens – sung _vivacious_ and _fire._

“Umm, can I come inside?”

Levi blinked. He’d been standing in the doorway, staring at the kid like a creeper, for a good minute and a half. Behind him, Hange was peering over his shoulder at the new arrival. “Levi? Who’s this? A friend? Can I talk to him?”

“Yes and no,” Levi addressed both of them, pulling the boy inside and shutting the door behind him. Speaking to Hange, Levi added, “I just ordered something for the party, and the kid’s delivering. Leave him alone.”

Flower Boy blushed a bit and ducked his head, abashed. Levi grabbed his arm and led him into the kitchen, Hange still trailing after them. “You have it?”

The kid nodded, and set down the box. “Mikasa was sorta pissed about the botched delivery, but she was able to find some more blossoms in time. They’re pretty fresh since we just cut them this afternoon, and they should be intact. They weren’t in the box that long.”

The blossoms were, in fact, intact, and Hange immediately seized the cardboard container and dumped the cherry blossoms on the floor, declaring that it would make the living room more aesthetically pleasing. They did add an elaborate, holiday feel as they were tossed up by guests’ footsteps and skimmed the oak floor in sweet, perfumed pink clouds. One of an officer’s kids tried to use them to make flower crowns and bracelets, which did shut the brats up for a bit. That was nice. 

Hange shoved a mug of nog into the delivery boy’s hand and – with a knowing smile in Levi’s direction – insisted that he should stay for a bit and warm up. Left alone, Levi and Flower Boy chatted for the next hour or so. Levi was entranced by the way every word from the boy sounded like the voice of a star or angel, all music and hidden laughter. 

His name was Eren, and he attended Trost City University. His boss, Mikasa, was actually his sister (although sometimes the lines between the two roles blurred), and his mother owned the florist’s boutique they worked for. Levi returned the favor, talking a little about himself. When Levi mentioned that he was a police officer, Eren laughed. Confused and enchanted, Levi narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “What?”

“You’re not very imposing for a police officer,” Eren answered, eyes dancing. “You’re so short.”

“You know what? Fuck you,”

Eren just grinned. 

When Eren finally left, explaining that he needed to go in case his parents got worried, Levi seized his hand at the door. 

“Can I see you again?” Levi asked. He was so breathlessly, blissfully scorched by the heat of the boy’s skin. Touching Eren was huddling around a campfire in the dark – warm, and safe, with some semblance of kindness and strength. 

The kid looked a little surprised by the request, and for a moment Levi was inexplicably terrified that it was the wrong kind of surprised - the surprise of being told senile aunt Millie wanted you to spend the weekend, or something like that. A moment later, though, the kid let loose another ridiculously bright smile. “Of course,”

Eren scrawled his number on a pieces of notepad paper and passed it over to Levi with a shy smile. 

When Levi unfolded it later that night, a smattering of captured cherry blossoms fell free from the folded paper and scattered over his face. Levi sneezed and swore, but it was without any real venom. He ended up digging out his old dictionary from the back of the bookshelf to press the petals in. 

Levi spoke to Eren every night after that in spinning, bright conversations rich with cheap japes and colorful language. 

Eren took Levi’s words – the bad ones, and the ugly – and seared them away with fire. Then he soothed the ashes with water and laughter and replaced them with a sweeter thought. 

Levi’s name on Eren’s lips sounded so sweet, quicksilver waterfalls and constellational ponds in the sky. 

They spoke in the dead of night, watching the city lumber on as it always did, two mice before the elephant. Sometimes their talks were stilted or strange or jolting, but they always flowed on in time. Words tumbled over each other as color seeped back into the proper places, and Levi stepped outside each morning actually smelling the gas and snow and hearing the rumble of the sidewalk’s chatter.

It took him a long time to actually tell Eren, but when he did, he did it breathlessly in the hot summer night, eagerly spewing words in a tumult of “Thank you”. 

Eren never questioned it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, today was relatively short and sweet compared to yesterday, and it wasn't all that action-packed. I feel like it's acting as a sort of down time, because tomorrow I have something hopefully a bit more exciting planned. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it, and I'd also like to thank everyone who's given me feedback so far - everything has been overwhelmingly positive! Thank you so much, guys. :)


	3. Firsts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> clone!Eren; Near Future!AU. Levi is interning at his father's company, and he quickly becomes attatched to one of the test subjects.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I tried. I wanted to write this at the time, and I wasn't sure what else to do with it, but it just feels weird to read. I don't know why, but it's not satisfying. Hopefully you guys like it anyways. :)

“And here’s where we keep the subjects,” Armin’s cheerful voice and clacking boots echoed through the wide laboratory. “Mr. Smith kept this as a storage space for a while, but when the Recon Corporation started moving into genetic research, he converted it into space for the company. There wasn’t a lot he could do with the area otherwise. Who keeps an airplane hangar underground? You have to wonder what the architect was thinking.”

Levi followed on the scientist’s heels with a noncommittal sound of agreement, peering around the vast space. The hangar was wide and square with white tile flooring and a domed concrete roof. Pale overhead lights painted the space in a blue-tinged light, and the walls were lined with rows and rows of huge, fluid filled cylinders. 

Armin beckoned Levi to follow him and moved down towards the cylinders. “Normally we don’t show them to interns,” He explained, “but you’re Mr. Smith’s son, and he says we can trust you.” 

Levi jolted in surprise when he saw the people floating in the tanks, submerged in crystal clear liquid. Studying the lifeless forms, he noted that they were covered in tubes and tangled in cords, which hooked up to various machines on the outside of the cylinders. 

“They’re all clones,” Armin elaborated, walking over towards a tank a few down from the one Levi was studying. “Dr. Hange and I collected the sample tissue ourselves from a kid in Vienna a few years back. Some college kid desperate for the cash, probably. That’s where we get most of our experimental samples. We can mature the clones in about two years now, but they would theoretically grow normally without our treatments. We plan to test that idea soon.” 

He pointed to the tank he was standing in front of. “This one is our best.”

Levi moved over to join the scientist. The kid floating inside the tank was tall with broad shoulders with a mane of unruly chocolate hair floating gently around his face. Maybe eighteen or nineteen? “What’s his name?”

The researcher looked over at Levi strangely. “They’re clones. We don’t name clones here. It’s just called subject B129.”

“B129,” Levi frowned at the kid in the tank. He looked so peaceful and vulnerable when he slept. The oxygen mask over his nose and mouth and the numerous thin, metal tubes latched onto him looked invasive and cruel. Each pipe like a giant, floating worm burrowing into his abdomen and back and neck. 

“What makes him your best?”

“Well,” Armin said, “it’s functioning.”

“And the others aren’t?”

“Okay, so – come over here,” Armin gestured for Levi to join him behind his console in front of the tank. When Levi did, he was faced with a multitude of different screens and panels that were monitoring vitals and others statistics he couldn’t understand. One screen was flashing blue and scrawling alternating green and red numbers in a seemingly random pattern, while another was displaying a 3-D model of the subject and zooming in and out while a chart adjusted constantly in the corner. 

Armin pointed to the monitor directly in front of him, a touchscreen with several different colored buttons displayed. “If I hit this,” He said, gesturing to a lemon-yellow button, “the subject will receive a small electric shock. Watch.”

Levi was about to protest no, don’t shock the boy, but Armin had already tapped the button. In the tank, the boy suddenly went rigid. His head snapped backwards, and both of his hands began to spasm uncontrollably. 

It was sickening. 

“See? Subject B129 responds to stimuli. The others clones, however, don’t give any indication that they’ve received the stimuli at all. Even when we monitor their brainwaves and muscle contraction patterns, there’s absolutely no response," Armin smiled. “And B129 is the only subject who has ever woken up.”

“Is that uncommon?”

“Not usually, but this batch failed. B129 is the only one who appears conscious. What’s phenomenal is that it woke up while it was in the tank. We pump the fluid so full of tranqs, it could put a tiger to sleep.”

“What did he do?” Levi could imagine the boy thrashing around in the tank, alone and frightened. Did he try to rip the tubes out? Did blood coil through the cylinder?

“It tried to break the glass. Smash it. It didn’t work, of course, but if it wakes up again when we’re not around to put it back under, then it could cause substantial damage. We believe that it could tip the tank over if it really tried, and that would be a large inconvenience for us.” 

“Do you think it’s possible that he’d wake up again?”

“After the first time, Hange wanted to increase its dosage of sedatives to ensure that it would stay under. Thankfully, I managed to convince her that exposing it to any more chemicals might ultimately prove lethal. It’s not safer than it was before, so I guess it’s possible,” 

Armin glanced affectionately at the clone. “I hope it doesn’t wake up, though. Hange and I plan to use B129 for our experiments next month. You know, I’m sure Dr. Hange would let you come if you wanted. We’re going to do some basic pain-oriented stimulation and some social observation – how the subject reacts to music, things like that. It might be beneficial for you to see how we operate here at Recon Corp.”

“I’ll think about it,” Levi said. Basic pain stimulation (What was complex pain? Would they try that too?) was such an ugly phrase, nine icy syllables that had no place in a sentence about a human being. 

Armin checked his watch and squeaked in alarm. “Oh crap, we’re half an hour late! You have to go home, and I’m supposed to be in a meeting with Jean and Hange in five minutes. Here, I’ll take you out.” 

______________________________

After that, Levi came down to watch the clones as much as he could. He jumped at the chance to slip into the lab during work, darting around for a quick look when he was on a coffee run or when he had the chance to take a bathroom break.

There were thirty clones in total, all identical except for the positions of their floating hair. 

Levi only ever paid attention to B129, though. He was intelligent and awake, more alive than his brothers, and Levi was killed by the idea of him locked away in the dark, crushed below ground in a stagnant Plexiglas pond of chemicals and carefully tailored nutrients. 

It was appalling that anyone would be given a letter and a number for a name, treated like an object and an animal. Levi hadn't wanted to call the boy B129, so he'd started calling the kid Rogue. 

He knew that the current laws about clones had designated them as property. According to the government, clones were not human beings because they were not an individual, but rather a copy of a real person. They had no DNA of their own. And clones were built in test tubes and under microscopes, not conceived like a human. Clones had no rights, and labs like the Recon Corp could do whatever they wanted with clones they made. The other day, Levi had asked Armin what was going to happen to the other twenty-nine clones, who Armin often referred to as “defective”. Armin hadn’t batted an eye when he replied, “They’ll probably be harvested for parts. There’s always someone out there who needs a kidney or a lung.”

But - just because clones share genes with their “parent”, that doesn’t mean that they’re the same person. They have their own personalities and minds. They don’t even have to have the same body – scars or training can make two bodies look completely different. 

So Levi went down to the lab to check on Rogue and make sure that nobody had touched him. Hurt him. Every time he was able to catch Armin, Levi asked the scientist if Rogue had woken up, or at least stirred. Armin always shook his head.

After the second week, Levi managed to convince Erwin to give him a key to the lab during dinner. Levi chattered as brightly as he could about the research, and the clones, the wonders of the laboratory, hoping that it would push Erwin to give him more freedom. His ploy worked, and Levi walked away from his father with a shiny gold key. 

He used it to get into the lab after hours and sit on the cold, hard floor among the softly humming and buzzing machines. Levi would stand in front of Rogue, tracing patterns on the cool glass while he talked about school and playing charades with friends, and then on to Erwin and Armin and Hange, and how cruel they were being. How he’d get Rogue out one day, and then the clone could be his own person. Levi would speak for hours, drowning the lab in words that he’d been dying to say for years. How the laws were wrong and disgusting, and how it was cruel and wrong to call a clone “it”. 

That went on for not quite two weeks. 

\-------------------- 

“Levi, say that again!”

Levi had accompanied Armin on his daily rounds, and the two were standing in front of Rogue’s cage. Armin was leaning over his console, eyes bright and feverish with excitement. 

“What?”

Armin squealed and jabbed a finger at the charts. “There! Right there! Levi, get over here, this is incredible!”

Levi hurried over to the blonde’s side. 

“Okay,” Armin said eagerly. “Say something.”

“Just – anything?”

Armin grinned and waved a finger madly at the charts. “Levi, look at that! There’s a spike whenever you speak. Everything jumps – BPM, brain waves, pulse – it’s amazing!”

Joy and terror somersaulted through Levi’s stomach. What did it mean that Rogue was responding? That he remembered him? The notion of meaning enough to Rogue to be remembered flooded Levi with surprising warmth. But - what would Armin and Hange do once they noticed any sort of change in their lab rat? 

“Have you been speaking to him, Levi?” Armin asked. “Have you said anything to him at all?”

“Just a little bit,” Levi said hesitantly. 

Armin was practically bouncing up and down. “This is fantastic! Of course, B129 should be able to respond to outside stimuli, but that’s a theory, and we had no idea that it was this intelligent. I mean, it doesn’t respond when I speak, only when you do, right? Right. Then, it must be intelligent enough to recognize specific people.” The researcher clapped his hands. “I can’t wait to tell Dr. Hange! We have to begin experimentation immediately!” 

Levi just turned and walked away, leaving Armin to stare after him, slightly perplexed. 

Dinner that night was tense. As usual, Erwin bombarded Levi with questions about his day, but Levi only responded curtly and stabbed at his food without really attempting to eat it. He excused himself early and stalked outside the house. On the way out, Levi let the door slam shut behind him with a thunderous crash before he strode out into the young, breezy summer night. 

 

There was only one person in the research faculty’s lobby. Krista, the receptionist, nodded at Levi briefly and shot him a shy smile before ducking down in front of her computer. 

Levi passed a few scientists in the hall, but they didn’t spare him a second glance. _Just the boss’s kid again, back to poke around the lab. No big deal._

The lab was as silent as ever, deceptively peaceful despite the dark nature of its contents. Levi made his way swiftly over to Rogue and pressed one hand against the glass, resting his head on the tank and closing his eyes. 

“I think that they’re going to hurt you tomorrow,” Levi murmured. 

“It’s my fault. If I didn’t spend so much time with you, then this wouldn’t have happened. You wouldn’t know me, yeah? If you didn’t recognize me so much, you wouldn’t be under their microscope,” Levi curled his hands into a fist. “Because that’s what they’ll do. Use you up and then cut you into little pieces so they can stick you under a microscope. Or cut you open to see if your blood is red like ours.” 

Levi slammed one hand down across the glass, and the whole tank shuddered with a hollow thud. “Dammit! It’s not fair. Why can’t you be out here in the clean air instead of locked up? Why do they have to treat you like some animal – worse than an animal, actually, since animals have rights, but - scientists are supposed to be smart, and these ones are too stupid to recognize you as a human being!”

Something tapped on the glass.

Levi looked up.

Rogue’s eyes were open, and the clone was studying Levi through the cylinder. 

The first thing Levi thought was, _his eyes are incredible._ They were a deep teal-green color, wide and bright with fire and intelligence even through the tank’s fluid. Young, but solemn and fierce. 

The second thought was, _behind you._

Rogue was pointing behind Levi, towards the console. Levi walked over to the array of lights and displays, which was turned on even in the night, and looked up questioningly towards Rogue.

“You want me to hit something for you?”

Rogue nodded, head bobbing in the tank. 

“Which one? This one?”

No.

“That one? Wait, no - this one, here?”

Not that one, either. 

“Is it this one? I don’t know – oh, okay I think I know where you’re pointing. The red one?”

Rogue shook his head adamantly at that suggestion.

“Right. Don’t press the red button. Uh – this one?" Levi hit a bright blue switch at the corner of the console.

Immediately, an alarm started screaming overhead, and the lab was suddenly bathed in angry red light. 

“Oh, fuck! Sorry, Now I’ve ruined it.”

He really hadn’t. Rogue’s tank was draining. The viscous, soap-like liquid was expelled though vents at the base of the glass cylinder with a sharp hiss and spread rapidly over the floor. 

Inside the tank, Rogue began ripping off cords and tubes, and Levi cringed as blood began to trickle from the wounds where Rogue was tearing the metal pipes out of his body.

“Is there a way to get you out?” Levi shouted over the blaring siren.

Rogue frowned and cocked his head, mouthing, What? Through the glass.

Levi moved up until his nose was inches from the tank and yelled, “Can I help you get out?”

Rogue blinked and furrowed his brow, confused. 

Levi sighed in exasperation. He could barely hear himself think over the shrieking siren, so of course the boy would be having difficulty hearing him. But now wasn’t a good time to be handicapped by communication issues. It would be impossible for the staff upstairs to not here the siren, and Levi expected security or, at the very least, a group of disgruntled scientists, to come barging in at any moment. 

He did his best to convey his question with actions, but it’s not easy to find a way to communicate “escape” with gestures, and Rogue just shook his head before flinging himself at the glass.

Levi jerked out of the way as the case fell with a crash, sending glass flying in all directions while Rogue tumbled to the floor. Levi rushed over to the gasping boy and tried to haul him up, but Rogue waved him away and clambered to his feet, breathing hard. Wiping a streak of blood off of his mouth, Rogue scowled at Levi. “What was that?” His voice was raspy from disuse, but underneath, there were hints of a rich baritone and an unplaceable accent. 

Levi was so dumbfounded that he could only blink and, like an idiot, blurt out, “Huh?”

“The movements you were making. Are you alright?”

That nice little comment snapped Levi out of it real fast. “I was trying to ask if you wanted my help, brat. I didn’t look that bad.”

Rogue looked perplexed. “You looked awful. And I couldn’t understand you at all.”

“Is now really the time?”

“Levi?”

Both boys spun around, startled, and Levi’s blood turned to ice when he saw Armin standing in the ruins of the tank, watching the two of them with wide eyes. 

Levi pushed Rogue behind him and glared down at the blonde researcher. “Get out of our way, Armin. I don’t want to hurt you, but I will if I have to.”

“It’s okay, Mr. Ackerman,” A female scientist Levi had never seen before slipped from behind Armin, her hands raised out in front of her in surrender. “We’re not here to stop you.”

Levi studied her. She was slim, with dark grey eyes and shoulder-length raven hair. The woman’s lab coat was open, revealing plainclothes and a thick, scarlet wool scarf wrapped around her neck. “Who are you?”

The woman smiled. “I’m Mikasa. Armin and I have been trying to get the clone out of here for some time now.”

Levi turned to Armin In disbelief. “You’re working _against_ the Recon Corporation?” 

Armin nodded gravely. “Mikasa and I are members of the Wings of Freedom, a group that’s fighting to see the current laws on clones repealed and replaced with legislation that makes clones equal to people. The way the Recon Corp treats clones is disgusting and wrong, and I wanted to get a job here so that I could try to sabotage them. Freeing this subject –,” He nodded towards Eren – “- was my top priority.” Armin smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, Levi. I wasn’t one hundred percent sure that you were on our side, and I couldn’t afford to take any risks.”

Levi was still on edge. “How do we know we can trust you?” He demanded suspiciously. This could be a cruel joke on Erwin’s part to punish his unruly subjects, for all he knew. 

“If they weren’t, they would have shot us by now,” Rogue spoke up, actually putting a hand on Levi’s shoulder. “It’s okay, Levi,” Rogue continued, and Levi shivered pleasantly. He knows my name. “I think we should go with them.”

Mikasa smiled ruefully. “You don’t have much of a choice.”

As if on que, the door at the far end of the lab burst open, and a good dozen armed guards flooded in, shouting and raising their guns. 

“Get down!” Mikasa barked, shoving the group behind Armin’s console. A moment later, the lab was filled with the roar of gunfire. Bullets bounced off Armin’s console with pings and streaks of sparks, and more punctured the tanks of clones behind the four. 

Levi caught Rogue watching as bullets shattered the glass of the tanks behind them, spilling fluid and clones onto the floor. _They’re brain dead,_ Levi remembered with a sick feeling. _They won’t be able to breathe without the tanks._ The clone’s expression was grim, but his raw was locked, and he swallowed once. 

_Those are his brothers._

“All right!” Mikasa shouted. “Armin, Take Levi and the clone out the back exit. I’ll hold them off!”

“What? No!” Armin gasped. “Mika, that’s not part of the plan! We were supposed to get out together!”

“Yeah, well, that’s not going to happen,” Mikasa snapped. “Unless you suggest we charge Erwin’s goons and end up full of pretty holes, this is the only option.”

Armin hesitated, eyes darting between Mikasa and Rogue.

Another storm of bullets exploded around them, and sharp metal chips flew off of the console in all directions. 

“Go!” Mikasa shouted, ducking around the console to return a few bullets. 

Wordlessly, Levi snatched Armin’s collar in one hand and Rogue's wrist in the other. "Let's go."

It didn’t matter. The three went off as fast as they could towards the far corner of the lab. Rogue was slowing them down - the kid had never walked before, and he was stumbling over his own feet. Levi gritted his teeth and scooped the boy up in his arms while Rogue protested weakly. 

As they neared the back wall, Levi glanced back to see Mikasa watching them, one hand covering her profusely bleeding shoulder. The two locked eyes, and Mikasa mouthed “Thank you” before turning and biting into the guards with another round.

Armin was feeling the back wall frantically, his hands shaking. It’s over here somewhere, oh, crap, darnit, fuck, I had it yesterday. I just- here!”

The wall slid back, and the group scrambled through into a dark, musty dirt tunnel. Armin produced a heavy-duty flashlight from somewhere inside his lab coat and took the lead, tugging on Levi’s hand. “Let’s go,”

They walked in the dark for what felt like miles. Rogue was getting heavy in Levi’s arms, but he didn’t dare put the boy down in case he fell.

“I have a safe house for you,” Armin murmured. “A place you can stay for a little while, until we can get you some new identities.”

New identities. That’s right – Levi would have to hide along with Rogue after this. Under the current (bullshit) laws, clones were property. Because Levi was helping Rogue, he was a thief. Erwin would hunt him after this, he had no doubt. Mr. Smith was not a man to be reckoned with, and he would go to any lengths necessary to see his property returned to him. Even if his son was in the way.

The idea of leaving his home didn’t really bother Levi, but that was probably because he was hyped up on adrenaline and moving purely on autopilot, too exhausted from the night to really process anything. He was sure he would be scared later, and then Levi would feel alone. 

The “safe house” Armin brought them too wasn’t really a safe house at all - more like an apartment. But it was clean with running water and a bathroom, so it was alright. 

Levi decided right away that as covered in goop from the tanks, blood from Rogue, and grime and dust from the tunnel as they were, he and Rogue needed a shower. Desperately. While he went off to find soap and towels, Rogue stared out the window.

“What are you looking at?”

“The stars. They’re so beautiful.”

_They’re just balls of gas._ But Levi didn’t say that. The kid had never seen stars before. Let him be happy. “Yeah, they really are, aren’t they? Like diamonds.”

Rogue turned away from the night and frowned at Levi. “What are diamonds?”

Never seen those, either. “They’re a type of special stone. Very valuable, and they shine like stars. I’ll get you one sometime so that you can look at it.”

Levi located the soap and towels and tossed them to Rogue, who caught them with unsteady hands. “You can shower first. You need to clean up more than I do, and I don’t want to use up all the hot water.”

Rogue seemed to shrink in on himself. “I, um – I don’t know how to shower.” His sentence tapered off into a whisper.

Levi blinked. No, of course he didn’t. The kid – because he really was a kid, trapped in a adult's body - had been in a giant test tube his whole life.

“Okay,” He sighed. “I’ll help you.”

The shower was nice. Warm, and the cheap soap lathered surprisingly well. Rogue was silent and kept his eyes closed, leaning into Levi’s touch as the older man lathered the foamy soap into Rogue’s feathery hair and studiously kept his eyes on Rogue’s face.

“Hey,” Levi’s voice echoed strangely in the silence.

Rogue opened his eyes and fixed Levi with his glittering gaze. “What?”

“How did you know my name?”

“Levi?”

_Say that again._ Levi nodded.

“You said it, once. When you talked to me,”

Levi blinked. “You remember what I told you when you were in there?”

By there, he meant the tank, but he wasn’t going to say it. 

Rogue rolled his eyes. “Of course I did. I could hear everything you said. It's just that I ignore people, most of the time. I never listened to the scientists. You were different, though. You were nice, so I listened to you.” Rogue smiled radiantly.

Levi swallowed slightly. _This kid is going to kill me._

They didn’t say anything after that. After the shower, Levi showed Rogue how to dry off – although he certainly did not do it for him – and get into his bedclothes. 

There was only one bed in the apartment, and Levi was content to stay well on one side of the mattress. Rogue, however, scooted over until his face was pressed in between Levi’s shoulder blades, and fell asleep curled up against the man. 

Levi lay awake in the dark for a while, feeling the boy’s soft, warm breaths through the fabric of his t-shirt and smiling to himself in the dark. 

He still didn’t feel scared or lost or lonely, the way he thought he might after leaving Erwin.

Oh well. Tomorrow, he definitely would.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BPM - (heart) beats per minute.
> 
> Firsts - First act of kindness, first game of charades, first death, first stars, first night, first freedom, first shower, and first time sleeping in a real bed. First life, in a lot of ways. 
> 
> What did you think?


	4. Animals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dragon!AU. Eren is a young dragon who has to find shelter with the neighbor he didn't know he had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, sorry I'm posting this so late! Today was just one of those busy days, and I had to keep the story short since I have to study for finals tomorrow. _Alors,_ if there are any errors, I apologize. I didn't have time to do much editing. Anyways, just some light fantasy fun with the boys as dragons because this ship needs more dragon AUs yass. 
> 
> Just to clarify -  
> Bull = Male dragon  
> Dragonelle = Female dragon

The mountains were more than ideal for Eren. 

Swooping low over the jagged grey stones, the young dragon could see a hundred dips and tunnels in the rock. Most of them were rather small, but that was actually good – Eren didn’t want anything bigger than him to be able to reach his new home. A herd of mountain goats watched him approach, a swift, burgundy-scaled thing with the sun at his back, and when his wings threw them into shadow, they ran, scrambling down across the sheer cliff face. That boded well for the young bull - if there were goats in his new home, he'd have something to eat.

Up above the mountains, the wind was cool and soft against his scales, and Eren could feel the slight pressure of a warm breeze pushing him upward. He relaxed, gliding on the current while he surveyed his potential territory.

Dragons were solitary creatures by nature, and they only stayed with their mother for a year or so before setting out into the world to find their own homes. Generally speaking, dragons prefer to settle down in locations that humans find difficult to get to – mountains, volcanoes, deep sea trenches. 

In the end, Eren followed the mountains’ meandering stream to find his home. It wound lazily through the rocky, unhospitable terrain until it abruptly dropped off, plunging over a waterfall and into the gaping canyon below. Eren decided to make his home behind the waterfall in a deep, surprisingly dry cave that would have been invisible to anyone standing on the outside. 

The young dragon went about quickly to build a home. He found grass and reeds at the base of the waterfall and arranged them in a semblance of a nest. Eren made a point of gorging long, jagged claw marks into the stone, and occasionally scorching it with his fire, to mark his territory. He barely had to work at all in order to find food – fish caught in the stream were often thrown over the roaring, foamy waterfall, and Eren could reach out from his perch behind it to snatch unfortunate salmon and trout as they fell. 

The one mystery of the cave was exactly how deep it was. Eren didn’t have any belongings other than his nest, which left the majority of the cave unexplored. Beyond his cobbled-together nest, the cave sank into gaping darkness. Eren hadn’t developed the night vision of an adult dragon yet, so he had no idea what lay beyond his piece of the mountains’ innards. 

The summer and fall passed without much happening. Eren spent his days in lazy contentment, basking atop the waterfall in the warmth of the sun whenever he was cold and snatching a fish whenever he was hungry. Drinking some of the stream’s cool, vaguely earthy-tasting water when his throat burned with thirst rather than fire, and sleeping when his bones ached and his eyelids grew too heavy. There wasn’t anything he particularly wanted from the world. 

Then winter came. 

The cold didn’t bother Eren, not at first. 

When it grew chilly, he simply gathered some twigs and lit them with his fire, leaning into the dancing amber flames.

The day it began to snow, Eren slipped out of his cave and into the sky. He flew through the cool, cotton-soft clouds and sneezed when he accidentally inhaled a few snowflakes. The young dragon blew a spout of flame when he sneezed, and as he watched, the snow burned to water under his fire. A droplet splattered his snout. Eren decided to make a game of it, darting through the air to scorch the snowflakes, only to catch the ice water with his jaws.

Eren’s first problem was that the predators were growing more desperate in the cold. Bears and cougars would normally never touch a dragon. Over millennia of evolution, most animals understand that the smell of dragons – _fire_ and _metal_ and the thick, overwhelmingly spicy _anger_ \- means _pain_ and sick, sour-milk _fear_. They usually kept their distance from the young bull. However, it was winter, and prey was becoming scare as the goats and deer and rabbits moved on to warmer grounds. In the thrall of hunger, even a dragon might seem weak enough to be bullied. And Eren wasn’t especially big, either – about the size of a large horse. As the winter wore on, more and more lean, unkempt hunters slunk up to the dragon, snarling for a piece of his kill. But Eren always ran them off with his fire and took to the skies, out of reach of any danger that tried to come after him. 

One day, though, Eren woke up to find that the waterfall had frozen over. 

At a glance, it was beautiful. Sunlight shone through the icy wall and made it shine like a diamond, illuminating the wide-eyed fish ad bits of stone that were captured in the water. 

But it was a terrible, ugly thing, once Eren really met it. 

He couldn’t get out of the cave. The ice had sealed the entryway on all sides, locking Eren in the ice. He wasn’t bothered; tried to burn the ice away. But it was too thick for his young fire and stood, unyielding, until Eren’s throat felt as if it would blister from flame. 

Eren sank into his nest, shivering from the ice’s chill and slowly unfurling panic. He couldn’t get out, couldn’t hunt – and there were fish in the waterfall, but he couldn’t cut them out of the ice. Eren didn’t trust the waterfall for water, either. He had once made the mistake of licking a frozen pond, and that had cost him half an hour while he tried desperately to burn the ice away. 

So here he was, trapped in the cold without anything that really mattered. 

Eren stayed in his nest for a week. Every day, he would wake up to find the ice unmelted and unchanged, and he would huddle in the cold sunlight, unable to stay warm. Cold and hunger seeped into his bones, fear poisoning his blood, as time ticked incessantly forwards. 

After a week, the dark started calling to Eren, crooning to him, begging him to come on and step into the unknown.

And Eren didn’t have a choice – stay and starve in the cold, or wander into the depths of the mountain and hope for salvation. Certainty or risk.

He chose risk. 

Eren picked his way through the tunnels, stumbling through the inky blackness. He couldn’t see, and a lack of food made him unsteady on his feet, the cold sapping his strength. He could hear shallow scraping noises as his scales pressed against the tight passage. Every now then, a sharp jolt of pain crept through his haze to remind him that there were stones in the tunnel. Jagged, cruel stones. 

He didn’t know how long he wandered. In the darkness of the mountain, day and night were meaningless. Eren doggedly kept going, marking time by the scratch of claws on stone and his own ragged breathing. Every now and then, Eren would let loose a sputter of flame to find his way, even if he only had the welcome light for a few seconds. 

Eren was dead on his feet when he smelled the meat.

Deer, by the gamey, grassy smell. And burnt deer at that. But food. 

Eren wandered towards the smell, struggling through the tunnels to the meal. Every step was an agonizing effort, and his heart was beating a million miles a second, frantic and erratic. 

The scent pulled him out into a wide cave lit by small fires. Deliberate piles of wood had been set ablaze, warming the chamber, and Eren stopped for a minute to tremble in the welcome heat. 

_A telltale clink, a whisper of metal, as Eren’s claw scrapped over the ground._

He froze, watching gold coins tumble over the floor, and backed away as pearls and fist-sized emeralds spilled over the stone floor.

Stone worn smooth by claws.

Walls etched with clawmarks – gashes that started small and grew longer and deeper as the years passed, a marker of time and territory, and a testament to the age of the cave’s inhabitant. Under the deer, Eren had ignored the other smells - the woody, ashy smell of fire and the bitter tang of metal and scale. 

_Gogogo_

Eren backed up, his claws scrabbling on the stone, wings buffering the air around him as he spread them instinctively in defense - fear. 

Oh, but too late.

The dragon appeared in the mouth of the cave, a low growl rumbling from the dragon’s throat and making the rock walls shiver.

Eren whimpered, hunching down with his wings above his head in distress, eyeing the cave’s owner.

He was three or four times Eren’s size, a bit bigger than an elephant. A body wrapped in bands of lean muscle that rippled under his sleek, blue-black scales as he moved to block Eren’s escape. He had a full set of horns, curled like a ram’s, ridged, and wickedly sharp. The bull's rumbling snarl was demanding, impatient. _What are you doing in my home?_

Eren tried to explain, clicking and whining and begging. _Mistake_ and _Hungry_ and a plea to leave in peace and never come back. 

After Eren spoke, there was a span of silence. The older dragon stared wordlessly at Eren, who crouched, trembling in the far corner of the cave.

When the blue-black dragon moved again, it was to take a careful, even step forwards towards Eren.

The burgundy dragon wailed, scrabbling at the ground and shrinking away from contact, asking _why_ and _what and what was he doing?_ The other male didn’t respond.

When his head swung inches away from Eren, the red bull went rigid, the whites of his eyes widening in a display of fear.

The older dragon was only contemplating the intruder, though. For now, anyways.

Eren was weak - his ribs were easily seen through his thin coat of scales, which was dull from exhaustion and malnutrition. The dark red dragon was covered in scrapes and tears, and his legs were shaking with the effort of holding him upright. Eren didn’t smell wrong, so he wasn’t sick, but he was tired and helpless, and he couldn’t do any damage to the den.

The larger dragon stepped away with a warning _stay put_ snarl, leaving Eren alone in the hoard cave as he slipped out into the adjoining sleeping quarters. Eren was baffled by the display – what did the other dragon want with him? Why was he leaving, without punishing the intruder. 

He wasn’t really leaving, not really, because when the other dragon returned, he had a haunch of deer in his jaws that he tossed in Eren’s direction before sinking patiently on the ground to wait for Eren to eat.

The younger dragon spent a while mewling in distress over the meal, fretful and nervous. Untrusting. After a few wary glances in the older dragon’s direction to ensure that he wasn’t making any move to attack, Eren began to scarf down the meat. He mewled at the rich, savory taste of the deer, relieved to have something in his belly and that he wasn’t going to be torn apart by the larger animal. 

When Eren finished, he hesitantly approached the dragon and nipped slightly at his jaw, chirping his thanks. The older dragon brushed it off with a snort, but he didn’t push Eren away, and patiently stood still while Eren sniffed his ruff and chewed on his horns slightly. 

Eren stated his name, shyly in a stream of low, quiet clicks. Dragon names are gifts, a particularly intimate form of greeting and thanks, but this dragon had saved Eren’s life. It seemed wrong to leave somebody’s home without a name, since you had already seen a piece of them. 

_Eren._ The name came out as a rumbling purr on the older dragon’s jaws, low and somehow fierce. 

The other dragon replied in turn, with a name like cold water over sharp rocks and the crack of ice over snow. _Levi._

 _Levi._ Eren liked it.

Eren didn’t know exactly when he fell asleep, but he did, soothed to slumber by the warmth of the fires and a full stomach. When he woke up, Levi wasn’t in the hoard cave anymore, and Eren waded through the mountains of treasure, passing over jeweled chalices and old swords, coins and gems and jewelry, until he found Levi standing guard at the cave mouth. Eren announced his thanks with a nip to the older dragon’s jaw and a lick across the dark, inky scales on Levi’s cheek. _Time to go,_ Eren told the dragon. _I have to go home._

Levi’s reply was immediate, a sharp, angry snarl of _no._

Eren whined, ducking his head and pressing his wings close to his body in distress. _Please, Levi. Why not?_ This was not Eren’s home, and he didn’t want to outstay his welcome. 

Levi’s cave frightened him, too – Eren didn’t know where he was in the mountains, here. 

Levi huffed and flapped his raven-colored wings in an irritated fashion. _You can’t get back to your den. The water is still frozen, and you can get lost in the tunnels. Too dangerous.  
Stay._

Eren blinked, looking up into Levi’s steely grey eyes. The older dragon was serious - he thought Eren should stay with him in his cave, indefinitely. 

Eren tried to argue, tried to protest, but it was rather halfheartedly. _Too little food. No place to sleep. Annoying_

Levi snorted. _I can find more food. Make room for you to sleep. Not_ that _annoying._ The bigger dragon leaned down and nudged Eren’s neck gently. _Company._

That last, wistful word gave Eren pause. Company wasn’t a familiar concept to bull dragons. They only sought out other dragons when they were looking for a dragonelle to mate, and even then, those were never permanent relationships. But living possibly hundreds of years, alone was a sobering existence for a dragon. 

Levi was lonely.

The idea made Eren ache. He couldn’t leave Levi alone now, especially since the bull had been so kind to him.  
_____________________  


Eren stayed. 

Levi cleaned his wounds from the time in the cave and cauterized them with small puffs of fire. The sight of his scales alight didn’t frighten Eren nearly as much as it should have. He trusted Levi not to hurt him. If the older dragon really wanted to burn Eren, he would have had a million chances already. 

Levi showed Eren the sunken valley where goats stayed in the winter, so they always had something to eat. Levi was strong enough to break through the ice on the stream to get to the water and fish underneath. Cougars and bears never bothered them, warded away by the sheer size of the older dragon. 

Sometimes they fought, tussling gently in the hoard cave in between meals or during especially bad blizzards. Levi was covered in silvery, vicious scars in between his scales and around his face, and Eren wondered where he’d been before the mountains, what types of dragons had given Levi those markings. 

When spring came, Levi helped Eren find his water fall again, and the two were pleased to see that they were actually very close. Their homes rested on opposite sides of the mountain, and if one of them (Eren) didn't want to go the long way around the mountain, he could see Levi by going through the tunnel that connected them. 

Levi helped break through the melting ice waterfall and hovered awkwardly in the air while Eren checked to make sure that his belongings were intact. The older dragon had been quiet and moody as of late, bothered whenever he saw a budding flower or heard the rumble of springtime thunder.

Eren understood. Levi didn’t want winter to be over, because then he and Eren would have to part. 

Eren turned back to the entry to the waterfall, nudging Levi’s snout and letting out a soft purr. _Thank you._

Levi let out a sound halfway between a snort and a growl, the dragon equivalent of a grumble. _Welcome._ When he looked up at Eren, he huffed, _see you again?_ The older dragon’s stormy eyes were pleading. 

Eren hummed. _Of course._

The two made good use of their close proximity after that. Eren showed Levi how to catch fish over the waterfall, and the older bull snorted in amusement as he watched particularly rebellious fish smack Eren in the face while the burgundy dragon stuttered and snarled. Sometimes they basked under the waterfall together, finding relief from the hottest summer days. 

The good food and rambunctious play did Eren a world of good, and by the time fall was fast approaching, Eren could no longer curl on top of Levi’s back when they sunned themselves. The red bull was almost as big as Levi, and nearly as muscular. 

He didn’t need to rely on Levi so much anymore, but that didn’t change their relationship much - Eren was not weak, not wet behind the ears anymore, but he still needed closeness and warmth and Levi’s quiet friendship. 

When winter came and the waterfall froze again, Eren hurried through the tunnels, which were newly lit with small fires. He found Levi waiting for him with a deer, watching the snow fall from his perch at the top of the mountain.


	5. Rainy Days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vampire!AU. Eren's not a monster, but he's not entirely human, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short, more like stormy days that rainy days, and.. I don't know, this one is just the boys having a warm fuzzy discussion and showering and stuff. Cute but not really cute. You'll get it. It's late, and I'm tired, so I might have missed some stuff while editing. Sorry in advance. 
> 
> I'd like to apologize for this being late. I intended to write this as soon as I got home from school, and I did get a good chunk of it done, but alas, French finals. I had to give that priority, and so here I am, posting it now. I'm going to get started on today's prompt right away, and I'll have that up in an hour or two.

“Jesus Fuck, Eren. I thought I wasn't going to be able to catch you this time,” Levi sighed with relief and glanced over his shoulder and out of the alley to ensure that nobody was headed towards the two vampires. "This neighborhood is like a maze. Everything looks the same."

The streets stood. It was approaching three AM, and rain was pouring down in buckets. Droplets smacked against the sidewalk and bounced sharply off Levi’s drenched umbrella, gurgling down storm drains and _plunking_ against the streetlights. Thunder raged overhead, roaring through the soft applause of rain against the ground. 

A brilliant claw of lightning darted down from the sky, illuminating the pair in the darkness of the alleyway. 

Normally, Eren was fire made flesh. Tonight, he was crouched in the alleyway and shivering like a very wet, dejected dog. His shaggy brown hair was plastered to his face, and under the fringe, his vibrant green eyes were dull and reflective. 

Levi approached carefully, making slow, deliberate steps towards the boy so as not to frighten him. He had to point his flashlight towards the ground so that he could watch his step. Levi had gotten his shoes cleaned yesterday, and he’d be damned if he was going to ruin the good leather by stepping into drying blood. The sticky, thick fluid was a real bitch to wash out of anything, especially clothes. 

Eren didn’t acknowledge Levi as the raven squatted down to try and look him in the eye. “Hey, Eren.” Levi’s tone didn’t betray any emotion, but his normally stony eyes were quiet with worry. “Are you all right? Look at me.”

Levi gently brushed a few stray strands of hair out of Eren’s face and ran a hand down his cheek, sighing in relief when the fledgling vampire just barely leaned into his touch. The brunette’s cheekbones were wet with water, either from rain or tears or some combination of the two. 

“Are you all right?” Levi repeated, his voice hushed under the storm. “You didn’t get hurt, did you?”

Eren snorted and shook his head, mumbling something unintelligible under his breath.

“What?”

Eren ducked his head and scowled at the ground, refusing to open his mouth. Levi sighed, but the sound wasn’t without some sympathy. He understood – Eren didn’t want his mate to see the remnants of his meal’s blood in his mouth. 

“It’s not dirty,” Levi reassured him quietly, hooking one finger under Eren’s jaw and wiping away a stray strand of blood that had been splattered at the teen’s mouth. 

Eren still refused, to speak, but he did learn into the older vampire’s touch, ducking under Levi’s arm to curl up against his side. 

Levi produced a small wipe from the pocket of his slacks and carefully began to wash away the blood on the fledgling’s face and throat. 

This wasn’t new, these encounters of theirs. Eren might have been in his early twenties physically, but by vampire standards, he was almost a newborn. Fledglings were caught in a constant cycle of hunger and general discomfort as they tried to settle into their new rhythm of feeding. Not to mention, fledglings had to suffer through the unpleasant reconfigurations of a vampire body. Levi remembered how his sharpening vision had plagued his with migraines. At first, the pain of eating had been wince-worthy as his canines crowded his other teeth as they grew, and the development of stronger muscles and bones pushed him into aching constantly. 

Eren’s hunger was particularly violent, and the fledgling had no small amount of difficulty with holding himself back around humans. While Eren’s self-control was extraordinary, it could only last so long. When it broke, it did so explosively, regardless of where and when and who was watching. If not for vampires’ uncanny ability to track their mates, Eren would have been caught by police long before Levi ever showed up, doomed by the brunette’s inability to plan his meals. 

Tonight had been especially bad. Levi had been in the middle of meeting with a client at his law firm when Eren’s fear and the ragged, crazed edge of hunger had struck him, shocking him as if he’s been tased. The emotions had been strong enough for Levi to be able to feel them like they were his own, unsure if the wild, rushed tone of everything around him, from the client’s voice to a potted plant, were his or Eren’s. Levi had practically sprinted out of the office and torn down the highway in his car, feeling the rise and fall of Eren’s nonsensical frenzy. By time Levi had found Eren, huddled in the alleyway under the rising storm, the kill was long finished. 

Eren wasn’t going to speak anytime soon, and Levi understood perfectly. Vampires were made, not born, and so it was only natural that a newly turned vampire would be repulsed by the idea of eating what used to be their own kind. Eren, especially, thought of himself as human. The stubborn brat still adhered to a normal sleeping schedule and continued to consume food and drink, usually coffee and bread or meat. 

Levi had felt the same way once, when he still thought he could change back. 

Levi rearranged the umbrella so that it covered both of them, pulling Eren into his lap and rubbing the nape of the fledgling’s neck in soothing circles. This was their ritual - whenever Eren sank into his post-meal moroseness, Levi tried to guide him out with ropes of words. Not comforting words, exactly, never comforting words, but words that needed to be said. The truth. 

“It’s not your fault,” Levi began gently, his voice seeming strangely distorted and echoing in the rain as he spoke the familiar words. “No matter how much you try and fight the hunger, it’s going to overpower you sooner or later. It’s natural for you to be disgusted with yourself, eating humans, but there’s nothing you can do about it. That’s the way we are.” 

The older vampire sighed. “If it really bothers you, I can see if Hange can sneak some blood from the blood bank. Then you won’t have to hunt the living.”

After a long silence, Eren spoke up quietly. His words were murmured against the fabric of Levi’s shirt, and the raven shivered slightly under the vibrations. “How are you okay with it?”

“With what, killing people?” Levi frowned. “I don’t like it, not really. It’s just our reality. Vampires can only drink human blood for nourishment, so unless we want to starve, we have to suck it up and drain one every once in a while. We can try and minimize the damage, of course. Choose victims without families or connections, or prey on the foulest pieces of the world – murderers, rapists, they like. Nobody misses them, and they can’t make a positive difference to the world.”

Eren silently slipped away from Levi and out from under the umbrella, moving towards the unrecognizable meat in the alley. Reaching down a bit away from the body, Eren picked up a small brown object and tossed it in Levi’s direction.

The raven caught the soft, worn leather wallet and opened it without a second thought, peering in at a photo. _Oh._ Levi’s stomach twisted. The picture showed a tall, blonde young man with a pair of toddlers, both boys. A russet-blonde child was bouncing on the man’s knee, and the other was tugging insistently at his hand, eyes wide in a playful mockery of displeasure. 

Eren plopped down on the stone, still out of the umbrella’s sanctuary, and watched the flick of alarm and conflicting emotions that passed over Levi’s face – distain, concern, indifference. “He had a family,” Eren said quietly. “Those kids are waiting for him to come home tonight, and right now, they’re going to be scared that Daddy isn’t home yet. Does he have a wife? What’s she thinking? Or is he a single dad, and his kids had to feed themselves tonight?” Eren whimpered. “I fucked up, Levi. I couldn’t control myself, and I fucked up. If I had waited just another moment or two , I would have been able to get away from him, but I couldn’t keep ahold of myself for another goddamn minute!” 

Everything Eren had said was true. Levi leaned his head against the damp stone wall of the neighboring building and studied his young mate. The raven hated seeing Eren miserable after a kill. These sorts of fuck-ups – a lack of control, choosing the wrong victim, - happened all the time to fledglings. It wasn’t their fault, of course; they simply weren’t capable of managing their hunger yet. But Eren was so hard on himself, so shaken and broken after each feed. 

The brat didn’t know when to stop, either. Levi had once offered to go out and bring back meals for Eren instead of risking another miniature breakdown, but Eren had been horrified by the idea, telling Levi that if someone was going to die for his sake anyways, he may as well be the one who pulled the trigger. Eren put himself out there for the dirty work, which Levi admired, but he didn’t know how to handle the weight of guilt yet. 

When Eren finally looked up at Levi, his eyes had regained some luster, but it was dark and a bit fearful. “That’s not the worst part, though.” The brunette said quietly. 

Levi blinked at the fledgling. “Did somebody see you?”

Eren shook his head. “Levi, I… I liked it. When he saw me, when he realized what I was. I laughed at him when he figured it out, he looked so fucking terrified, Levi, and I laughed at him. And when he begged… oh my god, Levi is felt incredible to have that sort of power. I almost didn’t want to end him, I was enjoying it so much." 

The brunet fledgling was watching Levi anxiously, and Levi knew that Eren was afraid that he would be condemned for his confession. Eren would be happy to be condemned, though, Levi knew. The brat wanted to know that he was wrong so that he could be told that he was human enough to recognize his own evil, at least.

But Levi just grunted in agreement. “You want to hear them beg so that you can deny them as a superior being. You want them to run so that you can remind them that you’re faster than they are. Killing thrills you because it gives you the ultimate form of control – power over life and death. I know. I feel the same way during a kill.”

Eren’s eyes snapped wide in shock. 

“You’re not a monster, Eren,” Levi said firmly. “Monsters, and the people who become them, don’t worry about the morality of their actions. They can justify anything with any reason, and they don’t consider themselves beasts. You’re not like that at all – you can’t find a legitimate reason for you to enjoy someone else’s suffering.” The grey-eyed man reached down to grasp Eren’s hands, covered in rain-smeared blood, and began wiping the liquids away, washing Eren’s hands in the rain. The fledgling’s palms and fingers were covered in deep bite marks from the many times he’d tried to distract himself from hunger, trading one pain for another. Levi took extra care with the wounds, skimming over them with feather-soft touches. 

“Does this ever end?” Eren asked bleakly. “The self-loathing?”

“That’s up to you,” Levi admitted. “It can last as long as you want it to. But as far as my opinion is concerned,” He added with a ghost of a smile, “you don’t have anything to be ashamed of. Look at these.” Levi held up one of Eren’s hands, tilting the flesh to display all of the angry red bites. “they should make you proud.”

Eren winced and twisted away. “They’re horrible.” The fledgling protested. “All they do is show that I’m weak. Even when I tried to block the hunger, it beat me.”

Levi shook his head. “They’re beautiful. You’re so intent on preserving life that you would hurt yourself to try and sustain another. These are signs of strength and kindness, Eren. And courage, and willpower, and determination. What’s horrible about that?" The raven vampire bent down to brush a feathery kiss across his mate's lips. "Now come on, we need to clean up and leave before the patrols come around.”

Thanks to the rain, most of the blood and other spilled fluids were quickly whisked down the storm drain, but Levi and Eren had to spend a few hours breaking down the body into small pieces so that it could also get flushed down into the sewers. It was a cruel fate, to have your bones gnawed by rats in the dark, but at least something was being fed. 

The drive home was silent except for the purr of the car’s engine. Eren fell asleep in the passenger seat, sinking into the smooth black leather seat with a yawn before closing his eyes. He looked adorable curled up in the car, and Levi hated to wake him once they reached their loft. The raven patiently guided the stumbling, bleary-eyed boy into their loft, and, despite Eren’s sleepy protests, insisted that they both take a shower. Even under the scorching water, Eren was almost snoozing, and he ended up wrapping his arms around Levi’s torso while the older vampire shampooed his hair and lathered him up with soap, working the suds in between the creases and dips in Eren's body - the wrinkles in his palms, the slope above his collarbones - and gently rinsing the filth away. By the time they were done, the drain has run red and brown from dirt and blood, and Eren’s eyes were barely open. 

Neither vampire bothered to dry his hair, dragging themselves into bed before curling into their usual sleeping position. Eren wrapped both arms tightly around his mate, nuzzling the raven’s chest. Levi tucked Eren’s head under his chin and wrapped his own arms around the brunette, tracing idle patterns on the fledgling’s back.

Contrary to the stories, vampires do need to sleep. 

Think about it. Vampires need to have functioning brains in order to move and think. Their living brains can then send messages to the rest of their body’s organs to perform their daily duties so that the brain can be kept alive. As a result, vampires do have heartbeats and pulses, and they do need to breathe to supply their bodies with oxygen. And because their body can get tired, they need to rest. Recharge. Sleep.

Vampires weren’t cold, dead things, but humans who had simply contracted a DNA-altering virus. (Although it wasn’t surprising that they were so stigmatized, considering their need to feed on humans.)

Eren’s heartbeat was a gentle lullaby that Levi could hear without having to press his ear to Eren’s chest. In the silence of the apartment, Levi’s enhanced hearing could easily make out the steady _thump-thump_ _thump-thump_ of his mate’s heartbeat. The even rhythm of the sound was reassuring, a symphony of ease in the wake of the dark evening, and when Levi was lulled to sleep in the dark, he did so with a dream of wings and snow on the cusp of him mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, yep. Vampires. I wasn't sure what to think of that at first, but it seemed fitting. Also, I have a thing for the boys showering together such fluff yass 
> 
> What did you think?
> 
> Anywho, I promised smut next chapter, so I'm going to go ahead and write today's prompt.


	6. Love Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Modern AU with Famous!Levi. Levi comes home from a big tour, and Eren is more than happy to welcome him home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know. Late again. Gah, this took me way to long to write. But anyways, it's done now. 
> 
> This chapter is very much NSWF. It's pretty much just 3,400 words of porn. 
> 
> The prompt is in here, but barely. I got a bit carried away xD.

Not for the first time, Eren was glad that the Château de Rivaille was in the middle of nowhere. 

Of course, it wasn’t as if the French countryside was exceptionally populous to begin with, but the land around the ancient family home didn’t have another inhabited building within a day’s drive. Every week or so, Alexandre or Adrien, the twin errand boys, would take a trip down to the nearest town for various supplies – food, water, batteries, and paints for Eren – so the Ackermans never wanted for anything.

The distance from any semblance of civilization actually worked out well for the château’s inhabitants. The distance from society gave the home a quiet, timeless nature. The minimal staff and news from the outside words pulled the grounds into a waking dream, and it was easy to get happily lost in the endless flowerbeds and looming forests around the château. Isabel and Farlan, the youngest of the Ackermans, could indulge in marathon games of hide-and-seek or tag in the mostly empty home. Kenny had a place to hide from his enemies. Levi was able to avoid the general populace. And Eren got to paint. 

Right now, though, Eren couldn’t help be forlorn. It had been two months now since Levi had left on tour, and the ache of the raven’s absence hung heavily on Eren. It weighed down his voice and gnawed at his bones when he slept alone at night. Eren’s siblings-in-law were kind, of course. Izzy and Farlan always had a wickedly fun game to play with their brother’s husband, but they couldn’t possibly make up for Levi’s absence.

The raven was supposed to be back this weekend, and Eren had been counting down the days until he could see him again. Never had time at the château seemed to pass slower than these last few days, dragging on and on in an uneventful blur. 

Nights were especially bad without Levi’s presence. It wasn’t just because of the lack of intimacy, although Eren definitely missed that, but really, Eren just missed the security of sleeping next to raven and knowing that he’d still be there when he woke up. And finding himself alone in the wide expanse of black silk that was their king-sized bed, Eren was acutely aware of the fact that it was too big for him, and that someone else who belonged in it wasn’t there with him. 

Eren wasn’t sure what time it was now. Very late, judging from the fact that Izzy and Farlan had finally gone silent, sleeping soundly somewhere in the château. The only sounds left were the rustle of a gentle night breeze gliding through the trees and the rustle of fabric as Eren tossed and turned, trying to find a comfortable sleeping position. When Levi was home, the brunette would usually curl up in the older man’s arms or pillow his head on top of his chest. Simply lying there on the bed with his head on a pillow and his arms at his sides, or on his side with a hand behind his head, seemed foreign. Even after a month, sleeping well was impossible without Levi. 

There was a single knock at the door, the sound echoing in the wide room. 

Eren frowned and propped himself up on his elbows. “Marin? Is that you?” The Ackermans’ butler had visited them in the dead of night before, usually with a message for Kenny, but Eren couldn’t fathom why he would come to his and Levi’s room. Unless Marin had a message from the raven? But Levi normally didn’t call so late... 

The person behind the door invited themselves in with small chuckle, stepping silently into the darkened room and locking the door behind them with a smooth click. “No, love, it’s me.” 

Eren squeaked and scrambled into a sitting position, letting the cool silk pool around his hips as he watched Levi with wide eyes. “I thought that you weren’t getting back until Sunday!”

Levi smirked. “My last stop got cancelled. It turns out that they were having a problem with the venue’s ventilation, and it wasn’t safe to have the concert.” The raven’s eyes glowed like silver in the dark as they ran lazily across Eren. “The idiots in charge had the nerve to tell me that they’d have to set the concert back by two weeks so that they could get the system fixed, and that I should find some place to stay in the meantime. I told them to fuck off. There’s no way in Hell that I was going to put off seeing you any longer than I had to.”

Eren swallowed under the raven’s unblinking gaze. “How was the rest of the tour?”

Levi curled his lip. “You have no idea how difficult it was to spend a month with Hange, that horrible woman.”

Eren laughed. 

“I’m serious,” Levi insisted. “She’s absolutely awful. Monstrous. If she wasn’t such a damn good musician, I'd throw her out the window in a heartbeat. She likes to shower first and use all the hot water, and then she’ll use a towel and then put it back on the rack instead of throwing it in the hamper like a sane person.” Levi shuddered. “I think I might have used one of her old ones once.”

Eren made a half-teasing noise of sympathy, thoroughly enjoying the narrative.

“And then,” Levi continued, “She brings her husband along for the tour. I don’t have anything against the idea, but the man is just as bad as she is. His name is Erwin, and his eyebrows are _absolument_ ghastly. They’re like a pair of hairy caterpillars. He’s lucky I haven’t shaved them off by now, oh my god Eren, you have no idea.”

“Mike was alright though?”

“Mike was fine,” Levi agreed, stretching with a wide yawn. Eren was treated to a glimpse of pale skin and hipbone as the tee rose slightly, and the brunette had to force his eyes to return to the raven’s face.

Levi’s silver eyes were shining with dark mischief. He’d noticed. “Did you miss me?” He asked.

“What kind of question is that?” Eren scoffed, but there was an edge to his voice that ruined the casual tone. “Of course I missed you.”

“How much?” 

You have no idea,” Eren admitted. “It was horrible here without you.”

The raven’s voice shifted into a lilting purr. “Did you play with yourself while I was gone?” 

Eren blushed. “A few times. Did you?” 

The raven smirked. “Once or twice. Not as much as I might have, but when you’re sharing a hotel room and touring with Hange and Mike, well, you have to use some discretion.” 

The idea of Levi moaning desperately for Eren in the night, wrecking himself until he was nothing more than slick flesh and ragged, frantic pants, made Eren shiver pleasantly. 

The raven watched Eren’s reaction through darkening eyes. “Are you tired tonight?”

“Nope,” The younger man grinned, his heartbeat fluttering in his chest. “Are you? It’s a long flight from Sydney to Nice. You must be exhausted.”

The raven waved away Eren’s concerns easily. “I got here yesterday and decided to rest up before I went home. Believe me, I’m not tired.”

“Well,” Eren said, a hint of eagerness creeping into his tone, “I’m just making sure. I wouldn’t want you to overexert yourself.”

Levi hummed. “Little shit.” He strode languidly over to the bed and hooked an elegant finger under Eren’s chin, seizing the brunette’s mouth in a deep kiss. Eren almost whimpered at the contact, melting into the kiss and opening his mouth to allow Levi inside. It had been so long since he’d been able to feel the raven, taste the familiar mint mouthwash, smell the man’s distinct, crisp shampoo. When Levi eased his tongue into the brunette’s mouth, pushing the younger man down onto the sheets, Eren reached up to tangle his hands into the raven’s feathery hair, trying to pull him down closer against him. 

When Levi finally broke the kiss to gasp for air, Eren tried to resist, tugging the raven back down on top of him. Levi chuckled darkly, pulling away to breathe raggedly for a few minutes. “So eager, Eren.” The raven’s eyes were dancing with dark fire. “Behave yourself, or I’m going to have to punish you.”

Eren whimpered despite himself, and when Levi came down for another kiss, he also slid one knee forwards. Even before the raven could coax him, Eren spread his legs for Levi and was rewarded with delicious friction as the raven began to unhurriedly grind his knee down onto Eren's quickly hardening cock. The brunette let out a soft moan, rolling his hips downwards in an attempt to find some sort of relief.

Levi’s mouth moved to brush against the shell of Eren’s ear, making the brunette shiver. “Are you wearing anything?” 

“Just boxers,” Eren panted, hands sliding over the raven to cling to his back and shoulders.

Levi grunted in approval and pulled all the sheets aside, watching the brunette twist underneath him and running an approving gaze over the hard angles of Eren’s body – the hollow under his neck, the tempting lines of the younger man’s v. 

Eren let out a low whine when Levi pulled away, leaving him spread-eagle on the bed and devoid of any friction whatsoever. The older man had just moved away to give himself space to undress. “Patience, love,” Levi soothed, pulling his shirt up over his head in one clean movement and tossing it aside. “I’ll be with you in just a moment.”

Patient, Eren was not. The brunette quickly pulled himself up into a sitting position and fumbled with Levi’s belt buckle. It took him a few tries to pull the strip of leather out of its loop and send it the way of the raven’s tee, but after he did, he immediately set to work undoing the button on the raven’s jeans.

“You really are an impatient little shit, aren’t you?” Levi purred, but the man didn’t push his lover away. 

“It goes faster with two people,” Eren said through a soft pant.

“Tch. Cheeky brat.”

Eren pulled the raven’s fly down quickly, and the older man helped him maneuver him out of the clothes, leaving them both in their boxers. Levi latched on to Eren’s neck, sucking at the skin until the brunette let out a wretched moan, and gently ran his tongue over the blossoming bruise. He continued down Eren’s throat with gentle nips and kisses while the brunette kept making desperate little sounds and baring his skin, pressing himself closer against his husband. Levi’s tongue traveled down across Eren’s shoulder to sink into the soft flesh there, earning a whimper from the brunette, and skimmed over Eren’s pectorals before curling his mouth down around one pert nipple. 

Eren gave a shuddering gasp at the wet heat of the sensation, arching up into the raven. Levi hummed in satisfaction, and the brunette’s gasps turned into a lewd keen as the raven bit down ever so slightly, rolling the nipple between his teeth. 

“L-Levi, _please._ ” Eren’s voice was ragged and broken under his lover’s ministrations.

“Please what, love?” The raven let go of the younger man’s nipple with one last lick, leaning back to study him carefully. The brunette looked absolutely, deliciously wrecked, his pupils blown wide and his chest heaving in sharp, shallow breaths.

“Don’t tease me,” The brunette begged. Eren adored the attention the raven lavished on him, always had, but he was starved for Levi. He didn’t want to be done waiting to come home only to have to wait for him to finish tormenting Eren.

Levi’s eyes softened slightly when he saw how distressed his husband was. “Give me a second to get everything.”

Eren propped himself up on his elbows to watch Levi lean over him to get to the bedside table, where he procured a bottle of lube from the drawer.

The raven slid back on the bed, bottle in hand. Eyes traveling down to the noticeable bulge in Eren’s boxers, he added, “Take them off.”

Eren scrambled to comply, tugging the shorts down and away and immediately lying back, spreading his legs wide and lifting his hips to give Levi a good angle. The raven followed suit, stripping down completely and emptying a generous amount of lube onto his fingers.

After a five-year marriage, prep was relatively easy and quick, but Eren found it torture nevertheless. Each finger was a tease, a reminder that Eren wasn’t quite filled, and he was trembling by the time Levi added the third finger. After a few careful movements, the raven’s fingers brushed against the brunette’s prostrate, and Eren arched off of the bed with a cry, hands scrabbling at the raven’s shoulders. “Levi – _oh, god,_ Levi, Levi please.”

The brunette’s breathing began to hitch as the raven carefully lined himself up, and when he finally pushed himself into Eren, the younger man almost sobbed with relief. After two long, torturous months barren of any sort of intimacy, the sensation of being filled was like being reunited with an old friend.

The raven’s head was buried against Eren’s neck and he was panting, shaking slightly at the sensation. After a few moments of stillness, Eren murmured, “It’s okay. You can move, Levi.” The green-eyed man rolled his hips a bit for good measure, moaning slightly at the sensation.

Levi let out a shuddering sigh, and when he spoke, his voice was husky with sensation. “How do you want it?”

“Go slow,” Eren whispered. “I need to feel you.”

The raven shivered slightly and complied, settling into a rhythm of slow, deep thrusts. Eren wrapped his arms around Levi’s waist and up to cling to his shoulders, feeling rigid muscle shift under his hands. Every thrust elicited dual moans from the two men. Pleasure was making Eren’s mind hazy, thoughts dissipating as quickly as he could form them.

Pulling back slightly to stare up at the raven, Eren marveled at the way the moonlight filtering through the open window played upon Levi’s skin, collecting in the dips of his body to define his muscled frame. Moonlight danced in the raven’s eyes, making the dilated pupils gleam like onyx and illuminating the thin bands of silver coloring around them. Levi’s hair was a mess, tossouled from Eren’s hands clinging to it and tugging.

"You're - _ha,_ Fuck – you’re so beautiful, Levi.” Eren managed to choke out in between moans, cradling the Raven’s high cheekbone in one hand. 

Levi let out a groan, his arms shaking visibly as he held himself up above the brunette. “You… should see yourself. Perfect, Eren. _Ah._ ” The raven clutched Eren’s hips so hard that the brunette wondered if they might bruise – not that he really cared though – and raised them up to plunge into the younger man with a ragged, tortured sound. 

Watching the raven in the moonlight, alabaster skin glistening with a fine sheen of sweat, Eren was struck suddenly with the thought that _This is our love song._

Levi sang about freedom, and strength, and the will to fight. Not love. As far as Eren knew, Levi had definitely never written a song about him, if he ever had written a love song at all. During their honeymoon in Spain, when they’d made love on a private beach by the sea, Levi had told Eren that he could never write a song about his new husband. _“There are some things you can never express with words,”_ The raven had said, with sand in his hair and a bit of cum still splattered on his lower stomach. Above them, the stars had shone like a thousand lights strung up against the sky. _“And one of those things is the extent to which I love you. I could speak enough words to fill the ocean and not be able to adequately describe my love for you, Eren Jaeger.”_ (Then he’d laughed, a real, rare laugh with teeth and a smile, and corrected himself. _“Eren Ackerman.”_ ) 

In the absence of words, this had become their love song. Mischief and longing, laughter and moans shared in the dark, the soft music of a purr or mewl, gasps and moans and the slap of skin on skin and mirror mantras of _Levi Levi Levi_ and _Eren Eren Eren._

The memory made Eren ache, with love for the short, dark-haired man. Despite his surly exterior, Levi was a real creampuff, and his smiles were the kindest gift in the world, earned with love and honestly and loyalty. Eren leaned up to wrap his hands around Levi, pressing his face into the raven’s throat and murmuring, “I love you.”

Levi groaned, catching Eren’s mouth in a fiery kiss. At the same time, a perfect thrust brushed against Eren’s prostrate, and the brunette cried out in exquisite pleasure. 

Levi held that position, assaulting the brunette’s prostrate over and over, striking it with each thrust while Eren’s hands grasped at Levi, the sheets, the air. The brunette was shaking and babbling senselessly, his vocabulary deteriorating into _Levi_ and _yes_ and _so good._ The raven was beyond words, slowly losing his steady rhythm in favor of the heat coiling in his groin, breath coming in rapid, hitched gasps and moans. Beyond speech. 

The raven brought a hand down between the two sweating bodies, and Eren groaned when the older man’s hands curled around his neglected, aching cock and began to pump it in time to his thrusts. 

It was actually amazing that they had both lasted this long after being away from each other, but neither man was going to complain. 

Eren came first, nails sinking into Levi's shoulders, back bowing off of the bed at a nigh-impossible angle as he came crying Levi’s name, seed pooling over his stomach.

The sight undid the raven, and he came as well, shuddering and burying his face into his lover’s shoulder. “Oh, fuck, Eren,” Levi groaned, his erratic thrusts slowing as he rode out his orgasm. Eren could feel Levi’s hot seed filling him up as the raven came inside of the brunette. 

Levi eased out of Eren, leaving the spent brunette with a soft mewl on his lips at the loss, before sinking down next to the younger man to catch his breath. For a few minutes, the room was silent except for the ragged breathing of the two Ackermans. 

Eren turned on his side to face Levi. “That was so wonderful, Levi.”

Levi laughed a little, showing a brief glimpse of a curled lip and white teeth. “It’s been too long, love.”

Eren made a bright sound of agreement and snuggled in closer to Levi, pressing their foreheads together. “Every night was terrible without you here,” The brunette said, letting his hands settle on the grey-eyed man’s stomach. “I didn’t even like playing with myself. It wasn’t the same as having you.”

Levi snorted. “Well, I would hope so. Your grubby hand is a poor excuse for me.” The raven made a face, wrinkling his nose and peering down at the sticky white seed still smeared over his hips and hands. “And speaking of filthy, you and I are going to take a shower right now.”

Eren glanced up at his lover hopefully. “Together?”

“Together,”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I just say that I love cute but sweary Eren? And Levi who can be all hot and a big tease but gets all lovey dovey? And have I mentioned that I luv couples showering? I love couples showering. Couldn't resist. Anywho, I hope you liked it. :).
> 
> Expect to see Day Seven up tomorrow morning/noonish depending on when I wake up. I'm so sorry that I've been late these last couple of days, but we're having our finals now at school and they really get dragged out. As a result, I've just been trying to study and practice whenever I can, and I'm exhausted when it comes to writing. 
> 
> But enough of that, I don't want to get things too depressing. I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to read this and get this far into the story, and thank you so much to the people who leave kudos, comments, and make bookmarks! You guys are all awesome and you're the reason I'm writing this. :D


	7. Day and Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I turned Night and Day into Moon and Sun. Eren is the sun, Levi is the moon, and it isn't wise for them to fall in love. 
> 
> Not that it stops them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, DISCLAIMER: Don't take this too seriously. Planets don't talk, moons don't wear clothes, and there is no sound in space. Furthermore, this isn't quite how eclipses work, and the sun does not revolve around the Earth while somehow still having the other planets revolve around it. 
> 
> But, creative liberties. 
> 
> If you just see "celestial" instead of "celestial body" or "celestial being", that's not a typo. I just shortened the phrase so that the sentences would flow a bit better.

To humans, celestial bodies were strange beauties roaming forever in the endless, inky plains of space. They were admired and mysterious, examined and puzzled over for centuries.

But the reality of being a star, or a planet, or whatever the fuck you were, was that it was an awful life to live. You could go a hundred centuries without seeing a single living soul as you hurdled through space. When you did pass a neighbor, it was often only for a brief second. Not long enough to chat. It was easy to miss them. Or, maybe there would be other celestial bodies nearby, but they were too far away to hear you shout for them.

At least, that’s what Levi was told. He’d never really experienced the problem himself. One of the pros of being what humans called the moon was that he had Earth as a constant companion. Sure, the planet was annoying when he was wailing over pollution and dying species, but he wasn't a bad guy. The kid’s name was Armin, and he took all of Levi’s brooding jokes with a laugh, ignored the most offensive ones, and quietly stood by the silver-eyed celestial when Levi didn’t want to talk.

Plus, Levi had Isabel and Farlan. Humans called them Gemini and Taurus, respectively, and while they were wild and unorganized and a bit too bright sometimes, Levi ultimately liked them. They were younger than him, and respectful, even though they were more complex structurally. And both Farlan and Isabel had wondrous stories about the births and deaths of stars and the beautiful place beyond the endless night where everything in the universe eventually was pulled to so they could be happy.

Yep. Between Isabel, Farlan, and Armin, Levi had all the company he needed. 

Because the moon was smaller than Earth, and therefore pulled into Earth’s orbit (control), Levi had a job. Every day, he would take his time going around Armin and scanning the planet for any cracks or dents in the planet’s surface. He fixed the ones he found, but he rarely did find any. 

One day, though, Levi caught a crack in Australia, a jagged gap right along the west coastline of the continent. When Levi told Armin, the planet began to fret, asking if _it was bad,_ _would he be okay,_ _what could they do to fix it?_ Sighing, Levi patched up the gap with some stone and moonlight before making his way around the rest of the planet. He didn’t see another gap. 

The next day was fine, not a blemish in sight, and so was every day for a month or so afterwards. 

But after that month, Levi found another crack in Armin’s surface. This one was a long, shallow scrape that ran diagonally down the middle of Europe, and water was trickling in where it met the sea. 

Levi sighed – water was tricky to clean up – and began his work. He packed more stone into the jagged cut, and he mixed dust and a bit of water to seal the rock in at the edges. A generous brush of moonlight smoothed the area over again, and he had to gently spread and bend the edges of the shorelines around the world to even out the water level. 

By the time he was finished, though, Armin was mewling in alarm. 

“Levi,” The planet began, his voice frantic. “Levi, what are you doing?”

The moon frowned in confusion. “What does it look like I’m doing, you ungrateful brat? I’m helping you so you don’t fall apart.”

Armin had the grace to look slightly abashed. “Well yes, I know, but – Levi, look. You’ve been here all day. You haven’t completed your orbit.”

Levi realized that the Earth was right – it had taken the entire twenty-four hours for him to nurse the planet’s wounds. “Oh, _fuck,_ ” He groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. What was he supposed to do now, wait it out? If he kept moving, he’d be off schedule. If he stayed put and tried to wait so that he could start his trip on schedule again, then other cracks could form on Armin’s surface. 

“Excuse me,” A third voice spoke up from behind Levi, its tone livid. “Could you please move?”

The moon turned, ready to give this newcomer a lashing _(What the fuck? Couldn’t he see that there was a problem?),_ but when he turned around, the moon immediately had to jerk his head back and close his eyes, cringing. 

He couldn’t look at the boy in front of him.

He was burning too brightly. Levi really believed that if he tried to look the kid in the eyes, those snakelike, viridian orbs would scorch his own to nothing. Even after a minute or so of standing next to him, a trickle of sweat was already rolling down the back of Levi’s neck. The newcomer was really and truly on fire, although it didn’t seem to bother him, and his skin burned the same shade of burnished gold. The burning boy’s lips were pulled back in a withering snarl, exposing bright white canines sharpened to wicked points.

“Why aren’t you moving?” The boy demanded again, licks of fire rolling off of him in waves. Armin winced as a burst of flame brushed past him, and Levi couldn’t help but bristle when he saw the kid’s discomfort. 

“I can’t move,” The moon snapped, ignoring the disgusting feeling of his sweaty shirt plastered to his back. Waving one hand at the newly closed crack in the Earth’s surface, he added, “I’m doing my job, you little twerp. You want me to just leave my planet to fall to ruin?”

“The only reason Armin would fall to ruin is if I can’t warm him up,” The newcomer snapped. “And I can’t very well keep him warm if you’re in my way, can I?”

“Guys, please,” The Earth pleaded, watching the two of them with reproachful, wide blue eyes. “Eren, stop it. It’s not his fault, it’s mine. Levi, it’s okay, he’s my friend.”

That gave the two beings pause, but they continued to peer suspiciously at one another. Seizing the chance to moderate the encounter, Armin cut in, “Levi, this is the sun, Eren. Eren, this is my moon, Levi. Levi, Eren. Eren, Levi.” After a pause, the blonde anxiously added, “Please try to get along.”

The moon and the sun peered at each other with newfound curiosity. Levi wasn’t particularly impressed by the sun. This twerp kept Armin warm? This was the center of their solar system? Levi had expected the sun to be older and nobler, more sensible. Not this little shit. 

The sun scrutinized Levi, surveying him dubiously. What Eren had seen of his temperament so far vaguely reminded him of a Chihuahua – small, noisy, and very unpleasant to be around. Eren had expected the moon that Armin spoke so fondly of to be somewhat like the Earth and to share his quiet and kind personality. But, well, he _was_ just trying to do a good job of keeping Armin safe and together. It wasn't his fault that he was taking so long to repair Earth.

Levi sighed. Moving through an orbit too slowly when someone was coming up behind you was the celestial equivalent of being stuck walking behind an excruciatingly slow person. And walking behind that person for an entire day was going to put anyone out. It was understandable that Eren was pissed. 

The two shared a brief glance across space, twin glances sheepish and shy, slightly apologetic. Neither of them was going to actually say “I’m sorry.”, but the words were echoed in their eyes. 

 

The two ended up moving on. Eren kept going so that he could warm Armin, and Levi had to move so that Eren could. Of course, planets can’t speed up or slow down their orbits, so Eren and Levi accidentally fell into sync. 

Their first couple of days were silent and moody, punctuated by small, sickly conversations and awkward stretches of quiet. The sun and the moon had a frustrating partnership. Whenever Levi had to mend Armin, the sun was stalled, and the sun’s constant heat made Levi’s head ache and his throat raw. 

Slowly, though, things got better. 

Once, after Eren let loose a particularly bad solar flare, Levi turned around to see that the kid was actually crying, curled into a ball and watching Armin whimper under the fire.

Levi hovered as close to the kid as he dared, letting one hand fall just shy of Eren’s shoulder. “Oi, brat. Why are you crying?” 

Eren continued to cry for a minute or so before he replied, his shoulder’s shaking. When he looked up, Levi watched, entranced, as Eren’s tears evaporated while they trickled down his cheeks, curling into pale smoke with slight hisses.

Even Eren wasn’t immune to his own heat, it seemed. 

“I don’t try to hurt him,” The kid whispered, wrapping his arms tighter around himself. “I can keep him warm and alive, but I still hurt Armin.” Eren whimpered again. “It doesn’t matter that I’m the sun, does it? I can’t take care of everyone all the time the way I should be able to.”

Levi was dumbstruck. Here was a kid who was had everything anyone could possibly want – light, warmth, the admiration of planets – and was unhappy with it. Eren was upset because he wasn’t as strong as he thought he should be, even if he was a hundred times stronger than Levi or Armin, or Farlan and Isabel. 

Eren looked like someone had just shot his dog. What could Levi say? “Nobody’s perfect?” He wasn’t a star. He couldn’t relate to the sun. 

Hesitantly, Levi reached up to rest a hand on Eren’s shoulder, wincing at the slow burn of the sun’s fire. Eren let out a squeak of surprise at the raven’s cool temperature, but uncurled slightly to let the moon scoot in closer against him in a silent act of comfort. 

From Earth, the sight was extraordinary. The moon wasn’t nearly big enough to cover the sun, illuminating the shadowy moon in a thin ring of gold-white light.

When they two finally broke apart, Levi was left in a cold sweat, shivering without the sun's warmth. 

After that, Eren periodically pulled the moon into a tight embrace, claiming that he was cold, that he was glad to see him, that he wanted the thank him for taking care of Armin. At first, Levi was surprised by the sun’s new touchy-feely behavior, but he wasn’t unhappy with the newfound warmth. 

Soon, though, it became obvious that the sun was just trying to be close to the raven. There really wasn’t any particular reason why he was being so touchy-feely. After he realized that Eren just wanted to be close to him for the sake of contact, Levi began to mull over each move the star made. Levi was frustrated, and ached, and just wanted the stupid brat to tell Levi how he felt instead of beating around the bush any longer. 

So one night, when Eren had curled into a ball around the moon and was yawning into his dark hair, Levi asked, “Oi, Eren. When are you going to admit that you’re in love with me?”

The sun froze and tried to jerk away, but Levi wrapped both arms around his waist and held him in place, refusing to let the star squirm out of this. 

Eren’s reply was stammered and frightened, his face red. Fire was licking up over Eren’s hands, a sure sign that he was anxious. The sun babbled an apology, denied it – the brat was nonsensical. 

Levi sighed. “I’m not mad at you.”

Eren was quiet for a moment before he replied. “I’ve ruined things, haven’t I?” The sun asked miserably. “You don’t want to see me again, do you?”

Levi scowled into Eren’s shirt, and the star flinched. Surely the raven was wroth with him for trying to be so personal.

“Don’t be stupid,” The moon reprimanded Eren mildly. “I never said that.” Levi peered up and studied Eren’s expression, watching confusion and distress shift through his eyes. 

“Then what-?”

“Stupid kid,” Levi sighed. “I don’t love you,” He admitted, watching Eren swallow at the statement. “But I care about you, and I want to be with you, so don’t leave me here.” The raven paused. “Or, y’know, however you say you like someone. Damnit, I’m not good at this.”

Eren’s eyes shone a little brighter, some of his fire settling down around him. His newfound smile was bright with hope and determination.

 

They were good for each other.

The sun was bright and warm and fierce, and Levi welcomed the star’s light and heat. It felt so good to be illuminated again, and to have something to look forwards to in the daily pattern of repairs and small talk. 

And Levi was calming for the Eren. The moon’s cool rock helped ease the constant pounding in the brunette’s head after a particularly hot day, and he felt lighter, more free after the sluggish, heavy heat dissipated somewhat. The raven’s mild, simple reactions and speech was also reflected on the brunette, and he found himself easing into the same state of calm that the moon exhibited. Now that he was more relaxed, Eren’s solar flares were also less and less common, and the sun was able to slow the burning of his fire.

Armin and Isabel were pleased that the moon and son were happy together, but Farlan approached Levi with troubled words rather than congratulatory ones. 

“Levi,” Taurus began carefully, “I’m glad for you, but this isn’t a relationship that you can be happy with forever. You’re a moon, and moons don’t die. They’re stone, and they can go on forever even if their planets change drastically. They don’t need sunlight or water or anything else to survive, and that’s fine. Stars aren't the same; they don’t live forever. They burn until they run out of fuel, and then they die. You won’t have the kid forever.”

The thought had never struck Levi before, and the next time Eren breathed fire into his lungs with their kisses, Levi wondered how much time the sun had left and clung to him even tighter. 

Eren loved the new level of closeness that Levi demanded, but the moon seemed troubled. He was distracted some days and fretful on others, always asking Eren how he felt, if he was okay. 

And when Levi didn’t tell him why by himself, Eren asked him. 

Farlan’s comment didn’t surprise Eren so much as make him angry. How _dare_ the constellation ruin Levi with such a dark comment.

Eren didn’t deny that it was true; it was. And he couldn’t reassure Levi much.

“I don’t know how much time I have left,” The brunette admitted quietly, cradling the moon. “But there’s no use worrying about it. Starting each twenty-four hours wondering if I’m not going to be with you today… that’s no way to live. You can never be happy like that.” The sun pressed a gentle kiss of the shell of the moon’s ear. “Don’t ruin today by worrying too much about tomorrow, Levi. And especially don’t worry about tomorrow when your version of it may never become reality. Stay with me and be happy.”

That was the last time they spoke of the matter.

Levi loved Eren. That much he was certain of. 

It was a selfish sort of love. While they stood still, Armin wasn’t warmed or fixed nearly as much as he should have been if the two were focused solely on the Earth. On the ground, humans saw the sun and the moon next to each other in the sky, and they were afraid. Tides shifted out of rhythm. The world grew cold or warm in a chaotic fashion. The Earth was wrecked.

Armin refused to let either celestial body feel guilty. And Eren and Levi really didn’t care – the universe could fall to ruin as long as they had each other, and they wouldn’t care.

If the universe fell to ruin because of them, well, they weren’t sure if they’d be able to pull away from each other. Even to save their friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Phew* okay, this is the home stretch: Chapter Eight is going up later, probably sometime tonight. It's just going to be cutesy and fluffy and fun.


	8. Smile

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a stream of unfortunate incidents, it finally looks like Levi and Eren's wedding is going to go without a hitch.
> 
> Until it doesn't. 
> 
> This is light and fluffy, and this one doesn't take itself too seriously. I'm not sure what kind of AU I'm looking at here. Let's just say that it's a post-war canonverse, and the squad is being reunited after a few decades to see their old captain get married to thier dear friend, Eren. And technology has advanced quite a bit since the end of the war, so everyone has cars and phones and things like that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I was just going to just have a cutesy wedding, but things got out of hand, and it ended up being quite the adventure. I hope y'all like it. :) The prompt is in here, I promise, but I was so happy to write a story about these dorks getting married that it sorta got sidelined.
> 
> Okay, so I know this looks late but I swear it wasn't. Technically. I had this all ready at around 11 and was ready to go ahead and click "post", but, of course, my laptop started updating, and I had to wait for it to reboot and update and reconnect to wifi and all that shiz. -_-
> 
> Anyways, enough of that. Go ahead and read. :D

Weddings were bitches to plan. 

Of course, it paid off, but that didn’t make the actual planning easy or fun. 

The week leading up to the event had been full of unfortunate mishaps. First, the florist had sent foxgloves to decorate the wedding’s beach pavilion, but Sasha and Connie’s daughter had promptly eaten enough of the flowers to make herself sick. If that wasn’t enough of an inconvenience, Eren’s custom-made tux had been destroyed when the poor seamstress speared the brat with a needle, sending him reeling into his titan form. And thank god that Levi had been able to uncover Jean’s scheme to have a mariachi band serenade Eren down the aisle. 

They were all remedied now - the choice of flowers changed to tiger lilies, Eren made a new suit, Jean heavily discouraged, - but Levi was currently faced with another issue.

Now, Levi was standing in the reception tent and staring at the wedding cake in wrathful silence. Somebody - Hange, probably - had thought that it would be an amusing idea to tastelessly point out the height difference between him and his fiancée. The five tier cake had two tuxedo-clad icons at the top, supposedly representing Eren and Levi, and both idols should have been the same height. Hange, however, had pushed the Levi figurine down into the cake, the creamy white frosting rising halfway up his calves. As a result, there was a good inch in height difference. 

There was no way in Hell that Levi was letting that cake get served at his wedding. He had to fix this.

The sad thing was, Levi wasn’t tall enough to reach on top of the cake from where it perched in the table. He could get Erwin or Mike to do it for him, sure, but the raven didn’t trust either man not to tell any other member of the squad about it. 

No, he’d just have to take matters into his own hands. 

Sighing, Levi cast a furtive glance around the room to ensure that nobody was watching. The reception tent had thankfully been set up the night beforehand, so right now it was deserted. Under the cream-colored tent, small tables and chairs had been artfully arranged in the soft, white sand. A little ways away from the tent, Bertholdt and Annie had arranged a game of soccer, but the participants were too busy laughing and pouring sand down each others’ shirts to notice. 

Levi procured a stepladder from underneath the table, removed his shoes, and carefully climbed on top of the snowy linen tablecloth to reach up and adjust the icons.

“Hey, Mister!”

Levi froze at the sound of the voice behind him.

Turning, he saw a wide-eyed little redhead with twin ponytails standing in her swimsuit at the foot of the table. 

The girl pointed behind Levi. “Mister, you should look out. That ball is coming right at you.” 

Sure enough, when Levi looked up, a poorly aimed soccer ball was hurdling towards him at a breakneck pace. Reiner and Ymir were in hot pursuit, kicking up sand as they sprinted after the ball, but there was no way they could catch it in time. Behind them, the rest of the soccer players were shouting warnings and stumbling over the sand.

Levi’s first impulse was to duck and avoid the orb of death rocketing towards him, but Levi Ackerman was not an impulsive man. He decided to go with his first thought, which was to protect the cake. 

The raven scrambled to move in front of the wedding cake, reaching up to catch the soccer ball in his hands.

The good news was that Levi was able to catch the soccer ball. It stung like a mother to catch the ball at such a high speed, but he did it, saving the cake by locking the soccer ball in an iron grip.

The bad news was that he didn’t really save the cake. Reiner, who was racing at top speed to catch the ball, couldn’t quite slow down in time. Once he saw that the raven had caught the soccer ball, Reiner tried to brake by digging his feet into the sand. Of course, this is sand that he was running on, so he couldn’t exactly get a good enough grip to slow his momentum. Reiner ended up half skidding, half running up to Levi and smashing into the cake head on. 

Levi could only watch in mute horror as the wedding cake was blown apart by the force of the impact. As Reiner sprawled over the table, bits of chocolate and vanilla cake, smeared with white and blue icing and candy roses, were thrown across the tent to rain down on the tables and sand like sad confetti. The cake toppers, still smiling merrily, went flying past Levi’s face to land in the sand with a dull smack. 

By the time the carnage was over, the rest of the group had caught up and were surveying the scene with wide eyes. Reiner was apologizing profusely to Levi, but the raven could only stare at the table in mute shock, not really processing anything.

All he had wanted was a perfect wedding. No delays, no accidents, nothing going wrong, period. Was that really too much to ask?

Apparently so. Here he was, two hours before the ceremony, standing covered in the innards of his wedding cake. 

There was no way they could order another in time. 

Unsure how to console their friend, the squad ended up frantically calling Hange to come down for the raven. When the brunette arrived ten minutes later, she rushed over to Levi and immediately began wiping bits of cake off of his suit. 

“Oh, my poor baby!” The brunette fretted, cooing reassuringly. “Don’t worry sweetheart, Mamma Hange’s going to find a way to make everything better before the ceremony. We’ll bake another cake ourselves if we have too, Levi.”

When the woman reached up to remove a smear of sea-blue icing from the raven’s face, Levi made his move. The grey-eyed man reached up, quick as lightning, and wrapped his fingers around Hange’s wrist. Turning to look at the wide-eyed woman, Levi spoke in a low, threateningly calm tone. “This is all your fault.”

Hange blinked and laughed nervously, alarmed by the raven’s grim expression. “Levi, sweetie, what do you mean? I didn’t knock the cake over!”

“No,” Levi said grimly. “But if you hadn’t fucked with the cake toppers, we wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place.”

At the mention of the cake toppers, Hange burst out laughing. “Oh, Levi! Hon, the cake toppers were a joke, a brilliant one if I say so myself. C’mon Vi, I was just trying to make sure that the cake was an accurate portrayal of you and Eren! Why go to have them custom made to look like you two if you’re not going to keep their heights realistic?” Before Levi could shoot her with another venomous snarl, the brunette waved her hands dismissively. "But enough chitchat, we have to figure out how we're going to fit this before the ceremony. For starters, I think you and I can agree that telling Eren about this would be a bad idea, right?"

Levi nodded. The last thing he wanted to do was give his fiancée something to worry about. He was probably out with his parents, or maybe Jean and Armin right now, enjoying his last few hours as a single man and fussing over the approaching ceremony. Levi wanted him to have fun, not be concerned about the recent nonexistence of a wedding cake.

"Right," Hange agreed. "Now then, there's no way we can order another cake in time, so that obly leaves us one option." The brunette paused dramatically. "We're going to have to make a cake ourselves."

Levi was aghast. "Shitty glasses. How can we make a five tier cake in two hours when a professional baker can't do the same?"

Hange chuckled. "Easy. We don't make a five tier cake. Oh, we'll make a cake alright, don't get your boxers in a twist, but it's going to have to be one or two tiers." The woman bent down to pick something out of the sand and held up the two cake toppers. "The good news is that we still have these, so at least we can still say that it's a wedding cake. You in?"

Levi nodded reluctantly. Putting the fate of his wedding in the hands of a madwoman was far from ideal, but he didn't have much of a choice. 

And, to be fair, Hange was a fairly reliable madwoman. 

"I'll help too," Reiner spoke up guiltily from behind Levi. The big blonde looked ashamed, his face beet-red and shoulders hunched. "Since I'm the one who ran into the cake in the first place."

"Me too," Krista interjected, nodding in agreement. "Sir, you deserve to be happy after all your hard work. I want this wedding to go smoothly."

"Where, Krista goes, I go," Ymir cut in, wrapping her arms protectively around her girlfriend. "I'll help too."

"I can spare the time," Annie relented. 

"Me too!" Bertl agreed hurriedly.

"Hell yeah I'm joining in!" Sasha cheered. "No way am I going to pass up a chance to eat some cake batter."

"Count me in," Connie agreed, exchanging a fist bump with his wife. 

To Levi, the idea of so many people crammed into a tiny kitchen seemed like a recipe for disaster. Hange, however, just beamed. "Perfect. We're going to need all the help we can get!"

 

They were all doomed.

First of all, Reiner had dashed the first carton of eggs to smithereens, so Hange had had to go and buy another dozen. That set them back about half an hour. Then, even though Levi's oven had an extremely _loud_ , _jarring_ timer, Connie had somehow still managed to burn the first batch of cake batter just enough for it to be inedible. There was was the fact that the one cookbook that Levi had about baking cakes was in German. The raven could fluently speak French and Japanese, and his Hungarian wasn't bad, but Eren was the one who was German. He'd been teaching Levi a bit of the language (mostly though dirty talk and rambling, late night conversations), but the raven could barely understand the text. He had to go solely off estimates on the instructions, and it was becoming increasingly clear that something was not quite right. The smoke from the oven was starting to smell burnt and far too sweet. 

When, according to the Levi's poor German, it was time to pull the cake out of the oven, the squad was faced with a sorry sight. As Hange opened the oven, the group was assaulted by a thick cloud of black smoke that smelled faintly like burnt rubber. Coughing and hacking, the team gathered round the fruit of their labors with watering eyes as the brunette woman set the cake on the counter and handed a knife to Levi with the words, "Hon, you do the honors."

Levi peered suspiciously at the cake. It didn't _look_ burned, so that was a good sign. In fact, it was a rather pleasing warm, brown color. 

His hopes were crushed the moment he tried to cut into the cake. 

He might as well have been trying to cut a fucking brick. The cake was as hard as a rock, and Levi doubted that they would be able to break it open with anything short of a sledgehammer. 

When the team realized that they had failed spectacularly, they dissolved into groans and laments. Levi swore softly and massaged his forehead. What was he going to do? He had, what, half an hour before he needed to be at the pavilion? There was no way they could try again in that time. And even if they did try again, there was no idea that their second attempt would be any better than their first. Levi's stomach was twisting as the raven ran through his options. What was he supposed to do without a wedding cake? Stick the cake toppers on the table? Of course, if everything else failed, he could have Erwin or Hange run to the store to just buy a cake, but that was rather undignified, and hardly suitable for - 

"Darling, what's going on here?" 

For the second time that day, Levi froze. The room collectively sucked in a breath as the newcomer stepped into the room and took on the messy, flour covered floor, smoking oven, and egg-smeared counter, widening slightly at each new mess. When the brilliant, sea-green eyes landed on Levi, the raven let out a shuddering breath and looked up at his fiancée. 

"Eren. I didn't think I'd see you before the ceremony," 

"Me neither," Eren admitted. The brunette wasn't in his tuxedo yet, still dressed casually in a red, form-fitting tee and tattered jeans. "Jean and I ended up finishing lunch early, so we were going to come back and pick up my tux and some last-minute flowers." 

As if on cue, Jean Kirstein sauntered through the doorway and scanned the trashed kitchen with an admiring "Holy shit." 

Eren peered up at the raven questioningly. "Why are you here? I thought that you'd be with Erwin right now, going over the ceremony. Or maybe my mom had cornered you." 

Levi sighed. "Something came up, love. I was trying to do some damage control." 

Just as Levi had feared, Eren's eyes flooded with worry. "What is it? Is there a problem with catering? Is that why you guys are trying to cook?" 

Jean chuckled. "Emphasis on "try", Jaegerbomb. This place looks like a war zone." 

"You could say that there was a catering issue," Levi admitted. "The cake was ruined." 

Eren blinked. "The cake? What do you mean?" 

"It's in pieces -," A terrible thought struck Levi suddenly. _Oh god, is anyone going the clean up the tent? We can't have our guests walking in cake._ "It's not complete anymore, love. We can't eat it." Gesturing to the kitchen around him, Levi continued, "We were trying to bake a cake to make up for the one we lost." 

Eren peered at the brick of dough in front of Levi. "I'm guessing that it didn't work." 

"Not even close," Levi admitted. "I'm so sorry, love. I didn't call you because I didn't want you to worry about the wedding while you were with your friends. I should have - wait, Eren, what are you doing?" 

The brunette was rolling up his sleeves, face set with determination. "What does it look like? Jean, grab me an apron, and get one for yourself while you're at it. We're going to bake a cake." 

They did it. 

Levi wasn't sure how, but they managed to bake a proper cake. 

It probably helped that Eren could read the instructions. The green-eyed man wielded authority in the kitchen like Levi wielded his blades, directing the group to do this and that at a breakneck pace. 

"Connie, Sasha, I want the oven to 350, on the double!" 

"Reiner! Open the window - yes that one - so we don't all suffocate with that smoke." 

"Levi, measure out a cup of sugar. The powdered stuff." 

The group was more than eager to comply, and within ten minutes, they had the cake in the oven. 

Levi turned to Eren, worried. "There's no way the cake is going to be ready in time for the ceremony," The raven fretted. 

Eren smiled luminously. "I know. Don't worry, darling. I can have someone come pick up the cake while we're at the ceremony and take it to the tent for the reception. It'll be ready by then, okay?" 

Better than okay. Levi also called someone to come clean up the pavilion. 

Now, at least, he could breathe easy.

The ceremony passed in a euphoric blur. Carla and Grisha Jaeger bawled like babies when the officiant gave Levi permission to kiss his new husband, and Eren tasted like sugar and chocolate from their cake-baking. 

Levi almost cried with relief when they reached the reception tent and found it spotless, cleaned perfectly top to bottom. He'd have to thank Rico for her help later. The food was fine, and during the cutting of the cake, both men were smiling like idiots as they sank the knife down through the layer of icing. 

The raven let Eren feed him with small bites off of his fork, and the brunette watched anxiously as his new husband chewed the cake slowly, eyes widening slightly at the taste. "Do you like it?" 

Levi grinned, genuinely, with relief and joy. "It's perfect, love."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I adore Levi calling Eren "love". It's a pet name that I enjoy no matter who is using it, but oh my god, it's so perfect for Ereri that it hurts.
> 
> So yep, that's it. That's the end of Ereri Week Spring 2016. A big thank you to everyone who had taken the time to read this, leave a comment or kudo, or subscribe. You guys are all awesome *group hug* and I hope I see you again when I start working on my next fic. I know updates were a little ricky these past few days, so thanks for being patient and sticking with me!
> 
> If you want to see some possible upcoming projects or just Ereri stuff in general, you can follow me on my [ tumblr ](http://lady-goldfinch.tumblr.com/)


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